TDWP: The Devil's Run
by bearblue
Summary: To celebrate Miranda's birthday someone throws a party; a hunting party. Andy has no idea why she's been kidnapped and abused, except for one powerful accusation that gets thrown at her. A lot. She only knows that she must survive or die trying.
1. TDWP: The Devil's Run Introduction

**Title: TDWP: The Devil's Run**

Pairing: Miranda / Andy

Rating: M, NC17, NSFW

Summary: To celebrate Miranda's birthday someone throws a party; a hunting party. Andy has no idea why she's been kidnapped and abused, except for one powerful accusation that gets thrown at her. A lot. She only knows that she must survive or die trying.

Words: 27120 (give or take)

Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction, which pretty well guarantees that " ownership, " of the some of the characters belongs to others (Lauren Weisberger and 20th Century Fox) and and that this work is entirely based on affection. This is not-for-profit, but for praise or at least enjoyment.

Beta Readers: Thank yous go to - Melanacious, LadyDragonstorm and Bonnie - my extraordinary friends.

Email:

Website: I do have one, look at my username and tack on a dot c o m .

A/N - This is a "get 'em together" story/ One Shot. I'm gonna keep telling myself that.

A/N - This fiction likely draws from several sources for inspiration - it mostly follows TDWP movie canon as a starting point, however.

A/N - I hereby label this story AU. While it starts from the movie core, it is set in a reality that is both magical and dangerous. *stamp* **AU** *endstamp*

A/N - This story involves appendages and physical transformations and happy bits connecting. If phallai offend, perhaps this story is not for you. *stamp* **CRACKFIC** *endstamp*

A/N - This story hints at blood-play and some tropes that contribute to a story of that nature. While it's very mild in comparison to some, there's always the hint of "danger" and stories get told and maybe a little blood and sex and hints of noncon and who knows what will trigger some people so *stamp* **AltSEX** *endstamp*

A/N - This story has serious, definite hints of "bad things that happened to good people." This includes violence shading toward noncon *stamp* **TRIGGER** Warning *endstamp*

A/N - Plural/Poly relationships happen to be one of my favorite story doesn't really go there, but... just in case... *stamp* **POLYAMORY** *endstamp*

A/N - This story uses a mystical creatures of the dangerous kind setting, which means that some events are darker and more dangerous and possibly unfriendly. *stamp* **MAYHEM!** *endstamp*

A/N - I have decided, just for my sanity, that family and really good friend names shall remain generally consistent. Thus, Andy's father's is Richard and her mother is CeCe, etc. This will go for Miranda's family and friends too. The family rule, shall remain consistent across the DWP stories. Though you may see them behaving differently according to their different realities, I shall make some effort to keep characterizations consistent also.

A/N - This story has has big dollops of angst, but it ends well.

A/N - Just for fanfic dot net - they erase my little notations of separation in the doc. I tried fixing it in the editor and it still isn't there in the fan fic. Thus, some of what you read may be impacted by the erasure of content by the system. My apologies.

LJ Tags: all: fiction, user: bearblue, rating: nc-17, pairing: andy/miranda, status: completed, genre: romance


	2. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 1

**Title: TDWP: The Devil's Run**

**Part 1**

Overly strong and vicious hands threw Andy onto a dry patch of ground where scraggly tall grass partially obscured her fall. The lanky, yet curvy brunette landed on her already scraped hands and knees. Her long hair covered her face, which otherwise revealed the cringe, despite her best effort. She had come to hate being pushed and pulled around, but she bit back the cry of pain. They liked it too much when she vocalized. As soon as she'd realized that, she'd stopped; stopped crying, stopped screaming, stopped talking or begging.

She forced herself to stand, trying to take stock. She already knew things were bad, already knew that they were far, far from any place with which she was familiar. Her shoulder spasmed, causing her to hunch, but she fought that impulse to protect the wound there, a vicious bite which was still bloody. It burned, but she would not acknowledge it; would not acknowledge them or anything they did to her.

She would only do what she needed to do to survive.

She took a moment to do a full one-eighty, turning slowly so she could see and try to at least guess where she might be. The conclusion she reached was that she was in a wilderness, where tall trees and mountain met under blue sky and she thought she could smell water, but wasn't sure. All Andy knew was that she did not recognize the skyline at all and there were no wires overhead, no sounds of the highway, no trail for SUVs to follow, no obvious signs of modernity. As they had not arrived in a vehicle, but rather had been pushed through and out a vortex, she thought, perhaps there wouldn't be. However, that might mean nothing. The only thing holding her sanity in check was the fact she was well read and already had known of the existence in magic, because of her family.

She paused in her observation when she took notice of another group in the distance. Even from where she stood, she could see they were all formally attired and she could hear the generalized sound of laughter and talk and music. She thought it might be her imagination that placed drinks in hands and a table full of what looked like it would topple with gifts.

She shivered with the realization that she was looking at a party. Then she jumped at the sound of a snarling snap and then yelp to her right. She skittered back, half afraid it was aimed at herself, but no, it was someone else, someone... who should not have been able to make a sound like that. Yet she knew they had.

Miranda's eyes grew hot as she watched as the remnant of an invading pack which tried to take over her New York territory, various rogues, vagabonds and enemies of the tribe and humanity, and sundry others, get pushed out into the hunting circle. The scent of their fear was almost as intoxicating as the drink in her hand. Most of these beings had been gathered specifically because they refused to play by the rules, in some way or another. Some, however, had simply been in the wrong place, at the wrong time. And some were there for the testing to see if they were worthy of the tribe; as her daughters once had been. It had been one of the few times she had not joined the great hunt and her heart had been in her throat the whole time.

Gratefully, they had passed. The only reason they weren't here today was that college had its obligations. They had called however, very early, to wish her well on her day. It had been good conversation, one which caused a genuine, warm smile to briefly cross her face even now.

She drew her thoughts away from that pleasant memory and once again in the present moment, Miranda inhaled deliberately, trying to sift the scents and discover what she could of who and what the prey might be, before the run. Then she went rigid with shock.

"What is she doing there?"

A woman, not nearly her equal, but important enough to be at the party, sauntered toward the silver-haired woman. "Consider her a gift. Everyone knows, after all, how she betrayed you. It was thought you might find value in her being made to run."

"Value?" Miranda replied, her expression seemingly mild, but her tone was ice.

The woman paled, but did not back away. She made a guess as to why and was completely wrong. "She's been Marked. And the incantations made. She'll have to fight or die like the rest of them. We are, after all, a fair People."

"Marked..." Miranda growled, stifling the urge to snap the woman's neck. It wouldn't do at a party. And it wouldn't change anything. "That's all."

Summarily dismissed, the puzzled bearer of what should have been good news retreated.

Even as a growing rage centered in her chest, Miranda felt an odd pride that one of the few of the staggering, fearful group, who seemed to gather their wits was the girl. She always had been smart and resourceful. Miranda watched as the brunette forced herself upright, brushing her hands against her designer jeans and the remnant of what might have been a respectable shirt at one time. This once, the editor hoped that she was wearing practical shoes. The thought caused a brief curling smile, before it disappeared again. Even at a distance Miranda could sense from the body language that the younger woman was not defeated, merely angry. She watched as Andrea looked around, taking in her circumstances with an unhappy glare.

"Oh, she is going to be a prize," someone commented and Miranda stiffened, biting back an urge to respond sharply. For a brief moment, Miranda wished Nan were returned from wherever she'd gone. She needed her friend's good humor, wisdom and balance. Lately, it was all she could do not to rend others down to their core.

The swaggering male continued, "I might even let her live. For awhile." The raucous laughter behind her caused a growl to settle in the back of Miranda's throat and she bit down against the first reply that seemed to want to roll off her tongue.

Mine.

Instead she said, without looking back, "That assumes, of course, you manage to catch her." One could not account for everything and after all, even though this was ostensibly a celebration for her, it was a gathering of the tribe and all would play and have equal chance at sport.

"She's human." The shrug was in the intonation. "Even with the traditional head start, and the blessing of the Mark, which in theory should even the playing field, she'll never make it. They never do. Humans are too weak to take the run and endure the transition at the same time."

Miranda took a sip of her drink, and her blue gaze unavoidably drawn back to the girl. "We shall see." She did not mention that she'd seen more than one human make the grade. Really, the People were sometimes far too arrogant for words or justification.

Someone announced, "Gather around, everyone! It is time for the games to begin!" And with that Miranda was summoned to the front, to stand on the dais for praise and honor on her birthday.

Outrage vibrated through the bruised and battered writer and for a few brief heartbeats, her expression was not one of defeat, but of indignation. Her brown eyes, fury in them, raked over the gathered. She and the motley group who she was with, had been prodded forward into a wide circle. It was close enough that she could hear the ringing sound of the announcement clearly.

She listened to the declarations, the telling of what was to come, with half an ear. She knew what she needed to know already. To these creatures, she was prey. She and these other people were to be hunted, like game. She could not let fear rule her. She had to think, had to process enough to make good choices. She had to survive. Her hand drifted to her belly, pressed there lightly. She was grateful that, with all the cuffing and moderate abuse she'd received so far, no one had thought to jab her in the gut. These people were too strong and she knew the consequences of such would be too difficult for her to bear, when she'd been fighting so hard to keep what was hers to begin with.

A part of her mind found grim mirth. No doubt this was exactly the type of stress her doctor told her to avoid, since the pregnancy was so new and she had a history of failure with everything they'd tried so far otherwise. Yet, it was as unavoidable as the elements. She would have to make do, endure, and pray, very hard, for a miracle.

As she watched the crowd part ways to allow someone to move forward, her breath caught. Her eyes widened as a silver-haired woman, of ordinary height, yet all elegance and power, strode to the small stand and take her place. At first, her pulse thrilled at the sight, and she felt a helpless cascade of want rush over her; one which, out of habit she quashed.

Then, terrible realization hit her, when she became aware what the familiar profile and the birthday adulation meant and, finally, at the last, understood. In her mind's eye, memories rapidly coalesced into a near animal awareness. Miranda wasn't human. She had never been. And now... now the real consequence of her need to leave in Paris was to happen. Andrea's expression turned and changed in visible waves, not to fear, as with the others, but to a terrible grief. One which she could hardly carry and nearly burst her will to silence. A whimper escaped, but it should have been a wail of sorrow.

When the time came, unlike the others, who, when the command to run and try for their lives was proclaimed, ran pell-mell in all directions, Andrea turned and walked, eyes and shoulders and body the epitome of the despondent and truly brokenhearted.

Most of the revelers hurried to prepare for their hunt. Some would choose to forgo weapons, while others would take a full set of gear with them. Miranda, chose, as some others did, to watch the runners before preparing. Usually the great scattering brought anticipation and a bloody-minded glee to her heart. As did certain times of tears.

This time...

Miranda had never, in the whole time she'd run the hunt, ever seen someone just walk away. She was not the only one shocked or moved.

"Who broke the toy already?" someone demanded. Some were apparently less moved than others.

While not the first time in her near-immortal, and still comparatively youthful life, Miranda felt grieved, the sensation of near-guilt still took her aback. If only she'd made her wishes more plain. But she'd thought sure that others would understand her muted message to leave Andrea to her life; so stupidly sure.

She also felt annoyed. And the questioner received the full brunt of it. She turned and snapped, "She. Is. Not. A. Toy." Blue eyes blazed and the words formed a verbal sword of truth that caused the speaker to back away from Miranda. The silver-haired woman then turned and stared at the back of the slow retreating form and snarled. Something had to be done.

_Don't be foolish girl. Run, Andrea. I shall find you._ It was a thought-form, which she flung out. Even she did not know if that were a threat or a promise and could not know that it would be heard.

But she knew that Andrea had become nearly psychic when it came to her needs, her wishes and commands. And while she did not know if the younger woman actually heard her, or just felt a sense of pressure to act, she still exhaled relief through her nose as soon as she saw the young woman begin to trot and then, finally, to run.

One thing about living a year in very high heels, even though that was years ago, was that one learned balance and sure-footedness. She had, for her own purposes, kept up with her exercise and that helped. Then, again,.Andrea was fleet to begin with, having played intramural sports in college. She'd learned to dodge and duck and move with alacrity. She'd learned to spot her foes early, and avoid them. Those skills, along with sundry others that she'd gathered over a lifetime or inherited from her parents and kin, or were just natural to her kind, came into play as she fled the glade and strode the barely visible paths of the forest.

Her family had always been different. Society said being youngest was the easiest, but not in her case. Though her parents did dote upon her, they couldn't quite seem to get past whatever it was that she lacked. She knew this, even though her parents never told her the totality about what made her family unique under the belief that she shouldn't be burdened with it, because of her "disability."

It had been one of the reasons she'd moved to New York with her now ex-boyfriend Nate in the first place. She had been determined, somehow, to compensate for that mysterious missing element with success in her writing, her life; even though she had intuited it would never be enough for them. In her heart, she'd thought, _let them be proud of me anyway_. And they did try.

They did.

Her Aunt Dorene, however, did not share her parent's views. "You're just a late bloomer," she would say and she'd point very specifically at Andy. "There's not a single one of our bloodline that hasn't come to their power eventually and you'll come to yours. You'll see." She still held fast to the belief and as Andy had grown and they'd conversed more, she had waxed on strongly now and then about things mystical and magical and how that worked in her family.

Thus, Andy had gleaned a basic understanding of what her inheritance should have been. It was power, which, apparently had all been expended on her siblings who were born before her. Though she had lived long enough to give up the dream, she couldn't find it in herself to be jealous. What was, was.

Still, she thought there were reflections of her family gifts in her, small things which she could do, but because they were so minor or useful only to her that she never felt the need to mention them. And her family wouldn't have been impressed anyhow. Being able to fall into the background in a classroom and go unnoticed when she wanted to wasn't exactly an earth-shattering skill. Nor was summoning butterflies; one at a time. Maybe. That one might have been just wishful thinking. And probably so was that quiet, persistent belief that she had come to be able to hear and understand Miranda on more than one level when she worked for her. Maybe that was just survival skills kicking in. Perhaps all those moments were her mind giving her some solace, but she did have the very basic talent for recognizing power in others and in her surroundings, just like the rest of her family. It was one of their few common bonds.

Her abilities might be miniscule, but it did mean one thing at this dangerous time. She wasn't entirely powerless, just not excessively so. And there were other things that moved in her favor. Running was something she knew she was good at, and once started, she took up the task as if she were the deer she was sometimes accused of favoring.

Despite her haste, Andy chose her path with care, watching for unexpected openings and quiet passages. She was aware, in the sense that she had guessed, that she had to find a way to mute her scent, to confuse the pursuit, but her first task was to put distance between herself and what lay behind.

The thought of Miranda, which at first had glued her feet to the earth, now pushed her forward and she thought she could see the woman's azure eyes flashing, he expression commanding. The vision made her blood feel hot, or maybe it was the run, but still, the energy, the thought of Miranda giving chase carried and gave her momentum.

Once more Andy was struck by morbid humor. She was running away again.

Each hunt had its own pattern and stamp. Miranda liked to think that she had a firm handle on what constituted the correct preparation for each experience and she always went out with full confidence that she would catch her prize or win her battles. Yet this time, that confidence was thrust against the awareness that the stakes were higher than usual.

Her mind briefly reviewed the events so far, and she thought of those who had made comments regarding the hunt. A small growl emanated, despite herself. The thought of anyone else laying a hand or any other body part on her Andrea made her blood boil.

Fist clenched, she decided that perhaps, this once, she should dispense with selecting "the best" outfit and choose the necessities. Time was of the essence.

The Mark, the bite of change and the hunt, had two potential hazards. The first was the permission of "free game." It carried a particular signature that the People recognized and could only be undone by a very few methods; death, claiming, forgiveness, blessing, or trued transition or any combination of the above. One who had the Mark could leave the preserve after a run and think they'd escaped, but until the Mark was gone, the hunt was still permitted. The second hazard was the transition, which not all took or managed and definitely not all survived. Some never transitioned at all and just because one transitioned, did not mean that one was of the People. All it meant was that their blood had been a match. It did not mean they were worthy. And for those that were unworthy, the Mark made them easier to find for the next Hunt.

The Marked were also Pack claimed. It was against the People's law for one Pack to hunt the Marked of another Pack, unless the Marked crossed a territorial boundary and committed a crime against a member of the other Pack, whether knowingly or unknowingly.

In this case, Andrea was favored. She was not a woman prone to giving mighty offense. Even in pursuit of her causes, she was careful in her phrasing, choosing fact over sensationalism and wielding truth like a shield and sword. Her careful boldness was one of the things Miranda admired.

Though she possibly could have bent the rules to favor herself, Miranda intended to obey the restrictions of the run that gave the prey their head start, to avoid setting a bad precedent. She was far too aware of those who were lax in their protocols. It made them dangerous, which led to conflicts among the clans. However, despite the need to honor tradition, she also intended to start as immediately as possible, because the thought of any type of Mark other than her own upon her Andrea was near intolerable. She had never intended for the girl to be hunted.

She was going to find the girl before anyone else did.

And once she did, she was going to claim her once and for all, like she should have done years ago.

Given the nature of the hunt, no special demarcation was in place to indicate where any should start. The only related obligation was that they were to allow the traditional amount of time before beginning their hunt. This, however, did not mean that people did not gather to wait. Packmates clumped together in conversational groups, while others milled about, finding people to engage or choosing to be alone.

Miranda, under normal circumstances, often used the time to reach out and solidify her base. She was not one who was prone to pacing or even impatience when it came to the hunt. But now she prowled, glaring out in the direction that Andrea had gone, anticipating the ease with which she would find her. Her mind had yet to come to grips with what she would do when she found her, but …

"I wonder how far they've gone." She recognized the voice from before and turned to see the man who had commented on Andrea. His approach hadn't, quite, surprised her, but she hadn't expected him to actually speak. He smiled toothily at her, "Not far enough, of course."

She bit back the snarl and forced a smile. She knew who he would go after, but it was part of the game. "Perhaps. But there are always surprises."

He nodded thoughtfully. Then made an offer. "Care to share the path?" It was an invitation to search together.

Her eyes narrowed at the flirtation, but her smile remained distantly pleasant. "Not this time."

"Well, disappointing, but good hunt to you."

She couldn't even begin to force an equal well wishing, and made do with a non-committal hum. She hoped he wasn't anyone important and then realized, she didn't care. They had not been formally introduced. He could be the next president and all she knew was that if he laid one claw on Andrea his throat would be in her teeth.

The games-keeper, one of the few who would stay behind to act as arbiter if needed, took the dais and quietly raised his hand. Everyone present stilled and looked to him. He looked at his watch. Then, fisting his hand, his arm dropped to his side.

Howls filled the glade. Participants sprinted away, some shifting as they ran, while others stayed as they were. Miranda was one of those who remained in her most human form and she did not waste any effort howling. She would hold back her change until she felt it was needed. Even so, she was the fastest, taking a far lead that took her quickly into the heart of the forest.

The space cleared within heartbeats until all that was left as evidence was the man on the dais, a few witnesses, and the shifting grass.

Andy found the body of water. It was not, as she'd secretly hoped, a flowing thick creek. It was a lake, a very cold and sizable one, spanning a distance that put the end of it somewhere out of her vision. Her lips compressed against the need to utter a cuss of frustration. She let herself stay still for a moment, breathing deeply and fighting past an urgent need for tears.

Even if she managed to run in the water for a ways, they'd follow. If she swam it, they'd know she'd never reached the end and would trail the shore. And it was too frigid to swim for any long length of time. Briefly, yes, but for the distance required...

She might as well stay on the shore.

The only choice she had now was direction, and that did not include following her tracks back. She'd muddled them as much as she could already and suspected that wasn't nearly enough.

She shuddered briefly, experiencing the chill as a breeze swirled past her sweating body.

She glanced down the length of the shore, both sides, resting her hands against her hips and holding a stance that allowed her to breathe more easily. She took a few more breaths, and then, opting to keep moving, she picked a direction. She bent then, and took off her shoes, wondering if she could compel herself to put them back on later, and knowing she would have to. Then she stepping gingerly into the cold wet, she walked.


	3. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 2

**TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt. 2**

Andy had to rest. She had to think. She had to stop running, just for a moment. She leaned against a wide-trunked tree, letting gravity hold her upright while she caught her breath. She took a strip of cloth from her jean pocket, a part of her shirt that she'd finally just torn off because the loose flapping had become irritating, and wiped her brow and face. Then she tucked it back away again, knowing she might need it later.

She glanced around, grateful to be in the deeper, cooling shadows, and tried to guess how far she'd run. An ironic curl lifted her lips; probably not far enough. But it was a good distance.

She did wonder at the size of the property, the land. During her run she had not once come across any sign of anyone else, including the other runners. That told her that it must be very sizable, which was disheartening in its own way and weirdly unsurprising in another. Somehow, considering who she'd seen, it made sense.

As much as one could make sense of things anyway.

She took a deep breath and then another, and when she felt like she'd found her natural breathing rhythm again, she closed her eyes. She whispered a phrase her Aunt had taught her and visualized the path she'd just run, imagined it being obscured, imagined herself fading into the background and being un-found.

She'd been doing this at several points in her journey, using this and other methods to obscure her path. She had no idea if it were working, but she felt the need to try.

She was so tired. She was constantly trembling when she stopped to rest, but when she ran, somehow she found the stability she needed.

A part of her thought that when she'd started out the day, she hadn't planned on running a marathon; especially one that involve mountainous winding trails and death at her heels.

Then again, she hadn't planned on being kidnapped in front of the medical building after leaving from her appointment either. So, there was that.

She pressed the back of her head against the trunk, briefly drawing strength from the respite and the cool and then, when she felt able, she stood away and started again.

If Miranda had thought it would be easy to track Andrea, she was soon disabused of the notion. The only pleasure the experience gave her was knowing that if it was making it difficult for her, it was surely bedeviling anyone else who might be chasing after the writer. The trail started off hot, but once she'd entered the forest, it had cooled quickly; much too quickly. Normally, even with the head start, the prey always left an easy trail to follow. But Andrea's trail did not follow the usual patterns.

Miranda paused at one likely point, having followed crushed ground and the hint of the clear sweet scent that the young woman exuded. She knelt, letting her heightened awareness seek what she most wanted to find. It was as if, every now and then, Andrea simply ceased walking on the ground at all and that was maddening in its impossibility. The young woman's distinctive scent and trail wound around, criss-crossing or disappearing at completely unlikely places and at the oddest time.

Even knowing that there were limitations based on the physical aspects alone did not help. On the other hand, Miranda had more to draw on than just her senses. She had a very specific tie to the girl, one which she'd denied for a long time because of its sheer inconvenience and unbelievability, but it had always been there; ever since she'd walked past her where she sat on that first day.

It was one of the reasons she had demanded that interview, even though she'd had no intention of rejecting Emily's choice. And when Andrea had walked in, smelling glorious, but looking so... very out of place in her world, she'd begun the never-ending internal battle. It wasn't until the girl had finally walked out, taking a bit of Miranda's soul with her, that she'd had any rest regarding her at all.

And even then...

Miranda closed her eyes and shook her head, still remembering the shock and loss and all those restless nights afterward. Stephen's demand for a divorce had been unsettling and embarrassing, wounding, but not entirely unexpected. But it hadn't been until Andrea walked away that she'd really felt as if her world had come apart at the seems. She could still feel the echoes of that sensation of "gut-punch," at the loss of nearness, to which she'd become accommodated.

And even then, despite the notoriety of how she normally acted when someone dared to try to go against her, she could not bring herself to lift a hand against the girl; her Andrea.

Someone, apparently, had decided that needed correcting, even though nearly a decade had passed since their parting.

An unverbalized snarl curled her lip, but she did not let her anger compel her. She understood that this had been about currying her favor. Too many people in the world tried to do something to please her for her to be angry about that. No, it was that they touched Andrea, hurt her.

Miranda's claws dug into her hand and she realized she'd clenched it into a fist. But she made a silent vow of correction. Then, inhaling deeply and pressing herself for better control, she began reaching for that sense in her that was Andrea and followed it.

Andy paused in the foliage, holding back the gasp of surprise. Every sense went on alert and she tried to determine what impulse had caused her to stop in her tracks. She couldn't place the exact point of decision, as the halt had been nearly instinctual - which had been the case through much of her flight. It was how she'd avoided danger so far, but she had the terrible sense that this experience was not one she could pass.

Something made her lift her head and sniff, and she caught an odor that even though it felt woodsy, somehow stood out as "more." She also heard a rustling sound, one that seemed a touch carefree, considering. Whatever it was out there, was not like her, was not being chased into oblivion.

Feeling vulnerable where she was, she looked for a place to hide or more defensible. Then, taking careful, quiet steps, she moved toward it.

Despite her best effort, it took her closer to the danger rather than farther, but she could feel the protection offered by the tree and the shadowed spaces there. It was not something she could ignore.

The tree itself was massive, wider than her two arms extended, and its bark was thick like armor. The limbs seemed to cover her, nearly cradle her, as she pressed against it. But it was also close enough that she could finally see the danger, see why she had stopped. She spied a tent and a man by it, sitting comfortably on a camp chair. Before him was a ring of stones, but with no fire yet, just the wood. Beside him was an open thermal blue ice case. He had a beer in one hand and a book in another.

A sound broke, not one made by her, but a bird in flight and close enough that it caused the man to lift his head and glance around. And for a brief moment, his expression seemed so normal and peaceful that Andy considered stepping out and begging for rescue. Then she watched as his nostrils flared and she knew, gut knew, that her luck as far as encounters with these dangerous shape-shifting creatures had run out, even as she watched a smile cross his exceedingly handsome face.

One thing about these beings, they were, for the most part, all very pleasing to the eye. But that just made them seem all the more dangerous to Andy now.

The man stood from his folding chair, stretching with relaxed ease. He set his beer down and dropped the book in the center of the seat. Then, after casually stretching and scratching his chest, he said, "I love this game. It's so much easier when the prey comes to you..." He shrugged off a vest, did not bother with the shirt, and then, with practiced care he lifted a pack, which had been hidden behind his seat, and began to shift.

Andy envisioned being invisible, but felt a great pressure and resistance and realized that the simple tricks she'd been using to preserve herself till now were not going to work. She wondered if she even had more run in her, but was also aware that simply making a break for it now would doom her. So she went still, holding exactly where she was, where she could see everything, yet feel less visible because of the way the leaves folded around her and the massive tree, which she stood behind.

She watched as his body lengthened and thickened, as his face changed. The shirt on his back tore and ripped away, but the pack slid on over his shoulders easily. He'd prepared for this, for her or some other one of the runners. But something about his lackadaisical attitude annoyed her and it took a moment for her to put her finger on it. He had not been at the party. Not that she would have recognized him, but she was willing to lay a bet down or would have been if there had been one to make.

She couldn't help herself. Her mouth opened and the words seemed to flow out before she could slap them down. "You're a cheater..." Andy taunted and revealed, throwing the words as she pressed against the vulnerable safety of the big tree.

"Maybe," the wolf in near-man's body drawled, grinning even more at the bravery displayed by his prey. "I like to think I'm a sportsman waiting for his bite to eat. And my mate won't like it much if I don't bring home a treat." She heard him draw a deep breath and moan lightly, "And my, don't you smell like a sweet, tasty thing." He licked his lips, his expression becoming hungry. He offered a very toothy and terrible grin to the shadows where she hid.

"Miranda won't like it." Again, it was as if she had no control over her mouth and she winced in disbelief at herself; as if she'd know...

"You don't say," he said, and he ripped what was left of his pants off with one clawed hand, revealing more of himself than Andy had been prepared to see. "Well, maybe I heard a whisper that it's you she doesn't like, and I'd be doing her a favor." He let his hand drop and took hold of himself, "Maybe I'd be doing you a favor."

"I don't need those kinds of favors right now. I have trouble enough." She closed her eyes very briefly as she realized her body was responding. She wasn't opposed to beauty, male or female, and this wild form was beautiful, but mightily dangerous to her health. Still, if she'd thought for one moment it would help her survive, she might have considered giving in, surrendering.

She had always been responsive. It was one of the aspects her lovers, all exes at the moment, had appreciated. And, she had confidence in her sexuality, her basically sensual nature.

And then there was Miranda and Runway; Andy recalled, very easily now that she was reminded by proximity and could no longer force herself to set the memory aside, how sometimes all Miranda would have to do is look at her and her internal sexual engine would start and buzz. She remembered having the horrid sense that Miranda had known, even as Andrea had made every effort to disguise her need. Sometimes she'd go home, hot, wet and urgent.

No wonder Nate had thought she had been having an affair, but she, being who she was, had been faithful until he'd broken up with her when she'd taken that damn call. And taking those calls had been all about a particular kind of compelling, something she never could have explained to her friends, except that she'd needed to hear Miranda's voice; even at her worst. She'd kept the last phone messages on her personal phone until she'd switched services, unwilling to give up that small portion of the editor for the longest time. She still mourned the loss of the business phone, paid for in full after the fact, but tossing the phone had been necessary action lest she be tempted to call back

God, what a time to be having these memories. She forced herself to focus on the present moment.

As she watched the wolf sniff the air and grin, she knew that he was aware of her responses and that her body was priming and preparing for an assault to make it easier on her. Even though moisture gathered and heat filled her groin as blood rushed to do its companion job of facilitating her ease, she was very aware of the difference as she held no personal want or desire for the creature; only fear and the need to live. And something else, which she had no name for, except that every time her mind even brushed by the idea of Miranda during the run, she'd felt a rush of heat in her belly; a longing for what could not be had, which nothing had ever replaced.

She looked now at this being and knew she had no intention of letting it touch her in any way, but intentions versus ability... She'd not intended to be kidnapped and beaten and bitten either.

He outright laughed, a deep, dark chortle that was half growl and half amusement. "You've got spunk, I'll give you that. Maybe another hunt I'd have let you go, but you're on the menu special for this one. People want Miranda happy and she ain't been happy since you betrayed her." He drew in her scent, "And my god, but do you smell divine. Did they drop you in a pheromone bath before setting you on the path?"

"I... I didn't betray her. I had to leave." Andy grimaced at how her voice shook, how unconvincing she sounded. Yet, she told the truth. "It was a long time ago." Long enough for her to establish herself, long enough that she should have gotten over Miranda. Not that she had. "And no. They... listed my supposed crime, waved smoke over me, said words I didn't know and then they bit me. Why did they bite me?"

His lips curled, "Whether you did or didn't really makes no difference to me. You got the Mark now and that makes you prey to do with as I will. Come meet your fate. I can appreciate that you aren't a coward." He caressed himself, but he hardly needed it. Her extraordinarily potent and delicious scent alone had brought him to readiness. "I'll give you dessert before dinner and my mate will join us. We'll have our fun and make it good, a little blood because we are what we are, yes, but it'll only hurt for a little bit and I'll make the end quick, painless, as a reward and keep you whole for the proof that you played well and deserved it."

Andy debated a reply, but it would be rude not to finish what was started. "You know I can't do that. You know it and I know it." She started backing away, slowly, very carefully and as quietly as she could.

"Can't say I'm displeased. It'll be fun chasing you. But I think you've figured that out." He lifted his vision and a howl tore out of his throat, then he lowered his gaze and it was as if he could see her through the tree. "Run!"

Spurred into flight, and this time being too close to the reason, Andy was not able to exercise the same care in her retreat that she'd been using previously. She ran, hard and fast and directionless. Where before the earth seemed to move with her, now it felt as if it grabbed and stalled her. Tree branches reached and grabbed her skin and clothes, tore at it. She knew she needed to calm down, but she also knew the danger that raced behind her, careless and unsubtle.

She rabbited across and down and then up again, struggling with the ground and sometimes scrabbling on both hands and feet as the incline steepened. Panic lent speed, but no grace, and she understood, in a surprisingly fundamental way, why all those girls in horror films seemed to fall on their ass at the most ridiculous times.

She did not fall. But it was sheer luck that held her upright.

She hit level ground at last and sprinted forward, winded, but energized by fear. She could hear him behind her, and knew he had gained on her. She spotted a likely path at last, one that might aid in her escape, but it was some distance away. She swerved and was grabbed by massive arms, which looped around her from the back and crossed over her chest. His claws dug into her upper arm, and she couldn't help the squeal of pain. "Gotcha!"

Even though she knew better, she struggled in his grip and kicked back. In a move like a wrestler, he looped a leg around hers and took them both down, until she was hands and knees to the ground and he was half-kneeling over her. Only then did he partially release her, holding her down easily with one big hand pressing down between her shoulder blades, so the side of her face and the edges of her shoulders were pressed to the ground. The other he used to begin to strip her. She could hear his panting breath, feel the heat and thickness of hardness through her jeans and between her thighs. She half expected him to say something, but he wordlessly shredded what was left of her top and then did the same for her bra, ripping it away so it didn't even hang down.

His hand was big enough to cover her breast and then some, and he did so, kneading it harshly. His claws pricked the delicate skin, but did not dig. She pushed up, tried to resist. Her hands scrabbled to find purchase, even as he slid his hand down her belly and, weirdly, just undid the snap of her jeans and the zipper.

She felt the hot edges of his breath as he leaned over her, and whispered in her ear. "Keep struggling, baby. Make it good for me." His hand lifted from her shoulder and instinct made her try to leap up, but she realized the mistake as soon as she moved, because her jeans and underwear tugged away in his grip.

But she still crawled forward, and was only forced back when he wrapped an arm around her hips and dragged her back, not quite all the way, but close enough she knew what would come next. She felt his palm on her belly and he leaned. "Now, play, but not too hard. I'd hate to have to carve you too soon." His claws pressed in, at that most vulnerable point, just enough to pain her, blood her.

Andy saw red.

She wasn't aware that she screamed, wasn't aware that her whole body flexed and threw him off. She didn't even know she'd whipped around and turned. A part of her was aware that he rushed at her, growling and angry and hands wide as if he intended to make good on a promise. He raised a hand to strike and from her body, induced by a new panic and sundry changes of which she was not aware, light and power spilled. She pushed him, hands of light to broad chest. It was like a noiseless explosion.

The creature was thrust back and back, through the trees and into the depth of the open sky and, out where the ground no longer was there, he fell.

Andy briefly came to herself, shuddering as the power suddenly winked out. She dropped to the ground, unconscious like a bloody stone.

Andy could not have been unconscious long, but any amount of time was dangerous. Yet, at the same time, she felt weirdly better, calm. Somewhat rested, as if her body had taken advantage of the short moments out to fix her. She did not know exactly what had happened, but she knew the why; knew that the need to preserve herself, and that precious life growing inside of her, had been triggered by the shifter's actions. She gathered herself together, pulling her jeans back up, but leaving the shreds of her top and bra where they lay. It wasn't like she could put them back on.

Despite "knowing better," she had to look, had to be sure. She tracked through the broken spaces, moving carefully, but not necessarily quietly.

She found the edge and realized for the first time that they had been on a genuine plateau. She looked down and spotted him on the ground, crumpled and broken. He moved, and she watched as a part of him twisted ever so slowly back into place.

She suddenly realized the danger. She couldn't let him heal and come after her again. She didn't think he'd be taken by surprise a second time, or even know if she could do it, whatever it was, again. Then she spotted the pack he carried and realized he hadn't even bothered to take it off, while he'd made his try.

She looked back and realized she had a choice to make and that it had to be the right one.

Andrea clambered down the rocky face, intending to take it slowly, but intuiting the need to hurry. She was grateful now for all those hours on the climbing wall, but that did not make it easy. Climbing walls didn't have crumbling surfaces, whereas mountain faces? Things weren't always as solid as they looked and she'd slid a few times, scaring herself silly. And what she was planning did not make her pathway any consolation. Days ago she would have felt shame about what she was going to do, but survival demanded she make certain choices. She heard the creature's aching breathing, its raspy grasping at life. The closer she got, the deeper the noise and the weirder she felt.

She could smell the blood. It made something in her aggravated and dangerous. She finally reached the precarious ground. She avoided looking any further down than she had to and pressed her hand to her belly, protectively, fighting a fierce nausea that seemed constantly to threaten her. She looked at the sky and just nodded. It was right on time, horribly on time. Unlike others, who were dominated by those kind of impulses in the morning, her body chose evening as its time of torture.

The movement of the shifter reminded her of what she dared, why. It didn't scrabble way, only because it couldn't. He watched her with golden eyes, not fearful of her yet. Though he should have been.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

Then, surprising him, and her, she sprang and grasped his head between her hands and before the shifter could shout out in surprise or respond beyond a feeble attempt to bat her away with a shifting, but still broken limb, she twisted. Hard.

The snap seemed to echo, but she knew that was just the harsh beating of her heart and the shock magnifying the sound to her ears. And she was almost certain she imagined the wailing sound in the distance.

Almost.

Then her body rebelled. She rushed to the edge, crouching on her hands and knees and arcing her back as anything that had been left in her poured out. The weakness embarrassed and galled her. The danger she knew it would bring, frightened her, but her body had its way until she felt raw and drawn with the power of it.

When it stopped, she wiped her mouth and rested her head on the cool ground and whispered, "I can't do this tonight. I can't. We have to be strong. Hear me. Strong." She willed herself past the normal duration and rested there, long enough to catch her breath, but not any longer. She didn't dare, and as soon as she was able, she retreated from the edge, back to where the dead waited for her. Once again she felt fear and regret potently mix, but now it was done and she had had to move fast.

She shoved the body around, careless of the weight, needing those supplies it had carried and guarded. She looked up, and out, trying to pay constant attention and then, she began to wrestle the pack open. The first thing she took was a belt and knife, knowing that, if she had to run immediately, this was the most important thing she could grab. Shaky hands wrapped the belt around her waist, but she worked quickly. It went around twice, but fit, once she was done, with the knife in its sheath at her side. Then she grabbed a black t-shirt, which still held the scent of being laundered, meaning it was clean. She knew there was no way she could carry the pack and run, so she desperately dug through until she grasped a handful of snack-bars, which she shoved into her pockets. Finally she took a half full canteen with its water filter, a rolled blanket, a tin of matches, and a rope and what looked like it might be a quick kit of some sort. She doubted she would make a fire, but she did not know if she wouldn't need it.

Gear grabbed and randomly settled on her, she started back up the cliff, though she did not make it a straight shot. She wanted to put distance between herself and the body.


	4. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 3

**TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt. 3**

It was as if the Gods were layering new things about which to be outraged in this Hunt upon Miranda. When she came upon the campsite, she did not need to be told that one of the People had decided to skip the party altogether. More, as she stood by the ring of stone and stared down at the book in the chair, and scraps of clothing, she could visualize what had happened, sense it.

Part of it was the aroma. Her nostrils flared as she took in a scent that had only seemed to get more delicious as the day had worn on. And combined with hints of blood and fear and other ... it left her filled with an even deeper want for the girl. She imagined it had been nigh impossible to resist in its pure presence. Any shaper would have responded to the scent that girl was exuding.

Any human would, though they would have mistaken it for the girl's charm, which while ample and sweet, had not been her only aspect. Miranda still remembered the hefty impact when she'd first scented the girl after she'd been with her boyfriend. It hadn't been repulsion, though by society's definition it should have been. No, she might have wanted to kill the boy, but all the addition of his odor had done was make Andy more delicious and prove her ripeness. Miranda had wanted to rub herself all over the girl. It had taken everything she'd had not to lay claim to her there and then, to mark her so no other would touch her without permission again.

The second time had been no easier.

The third time had led to her decision to make the girl's life more difficult by calling at all hours, even if she had to stay awake to do it, and task her with things to keep the younger woman too tired to play around.

Yet Andrea still managed to arrive at the office, fresh-faced, yet obviously well loved the night before; or even just that morning. Even though the girl obviously exercised care in her cleanliness, Miranda could always scent the difference in the woman. It was as if she'd been made to make a being's blood sing for her. It drove Miranda to distraction, which led to an almighty number of errands on some days, even if she had to make something up, to get Andy out of the building so she could get some work done. And then, she realized, more and more days passed where the boyfriend's scent was not on the girl. It hadn't been any more restful, as the young woman's scent apparently had a power of its own. Miranda had taken to discreetly carrying extra underwear for herself, just as a survival tactic.

Miranda shivered at the memory, which caused her to return more closely to the present moment.

She was aware that the scents and impressions she pulled in now had nothing to do with love, only basic biology. She understood it intellectually, but her inner beast had a ravening rage going that anyone would dare to try for what was hers and it wanted what was hers with a terrible ferocity. She forced herself into control, forced herself to piece it together. It was only decades and decades of self-control that allowed her to maintain the facade of calm, even as she guessed what would have happened next and the likelihood of the success of the man's pursuit and capture of Andrea.

In her minds eye, she saw a transformation and a chase, she turned to look in the direction it took and spied trampled earth. Her eyes narrowed, as she realized that she was counting two of her kind. Around the ring, she spotted only one pair of feet, but going into the trail, another pair.

Outrage upon outrage.

The silver-haired woman arrived on the plateau and the obvious scene of violence. Andrea had bled here, her blood mixed in the dirt, making the earth cry with her scent. Miranda noted the discarded and tortured remnants of clothing and the scrapes against the ground where clawed feet and human hands had dug in. Her lips pursed sharply, both against the scene that played in her head and her visceral reaction to it. Her pulse fired at the thought of Andrea prone and ready, because, oh... yes... Andrea had been, but the growl that accompanied the thought was all about the death and mayhem she intended for the one who had hurt the brunette.

She could feel the struggle, the fight, but at the same time, something else had happened; something which, against all the odds, had allowed an escape of sorts.

She knelt down, noting the other tracks, which had paused here also, and the fact that the while Andy's seemed to pick up, the other set, the male's, were just gone. However, there was a broken path, one where it seemed part of what shielded this small glade from the edge of the cliff, had been shattered. Both Andy's and the other set went in that direction.

Taking one last look at the scene before her, she stood up and followed where those tracks led.

With a prodigious leap, Miranda landed in a crouch beside the body. She took in everything. The open carry-all with goods strewn carelessly about. The male had been moved, shaped into a semblance of peaceful rest, despite its wracked and ruined body. The positioning puzzled her, because it was obvious that there had been a healing transformation in progress and then... it just stopped. The scent of Andrea was all over him, as was another woman, both fresher and older than the writer's. In fact, the scent was so blended, so deep, that there could only be one conclusion made about the relationship. However, there was something else that was urging her to attention. She got closer to the body and peered very carefully.

Because she was an alpha her eyes were better than most, all her senses were. She touched a finger to the male's chin and spotted the hint of bruising and experienced an afterimage of feminine, human hands gripping. Miranda gasped as understanding, and with it a bit of shock at the amazement it brought, hit.

Andrea had killed this one, beaten the odds. Then a shiver of premonition took her as she realized the next awful truth. The dead man's mate knew it.

Andrea stopped again, because she had to and because, at last, the terrain favored it again.

She'd found water, of the flowing kind, this time. It was a small creek, but something and the truth was that she needed to cool off, needed to take advantage of the night sky that had finally, finally rolled into existence. She needed to eat one of those bars. She needed to strategize.

She ducked down and splashed water, on her face, under her armpits, her breasts. The cold water caused her skin to pebble, but it felt brilliant and eased the growing heat in her. And she had a near compulsion to just stand and walk into it, sink into the water and not get up again for awhile. She hadn't bothered with the shirt, but had tucked it into the roll, in the thought she would want it later, but all she'd done, it seemed, was get hotter and hotter.

The water looked too good. And she needed it.

She took off her shoes, but didn't bother with her jeans and underwear. Her feet ached, but they weren't blistered. Practical for the win.

She laid in the water, clinging with her fingertips, though the water was shallow, to the ground. But laying back, let her look at the unfamiliar stars for a few moments, let the water rush over her head and down her body. Even with the stings of wounds, including her shoulder, which had never stopped aching, it was sheer, powerful relief and she felt silent tears, the ones she'd refused to let go and thought she was too tired for, slide down her cheeks.

She thought about next steps.

Once she'd gotten past the man, which she realized now was not necessarily a wolf, just a shifted creature, she'd been able to shade the paths she was taking again, had been following the trails the earth offered as shelter. It had led her here to this place surrounded by old-growth trees and this simple spring-fed creek.

She realized then she needed to get off the ground, needed to rest at least for a portion of the night and needed to plan for the day.

It really came back to the fact her family was weird. Most families, when you talked of sheltering in trees, spoke of tree houses. In hers, they had talked about how to walk the trees and make nests and hammocks and temporary shelters. Looking back, one got the sense that her family always prepared for treks like the one she was on, as if the need for knowing how to survive anywhere, in any circumstances, was a normal obsession. Or maybe that was just her Dad. "The trick to nesting," her father had told her, "is in setting the frame. Get the frame right and you can fill it with anything and do it quickly, just make sure it all matches. Very few people ever look up, but if they do, you don't want anything to stand out."

The shifters, she suspected, were not average folk, and were certainly creatures friendly to the night, but she also suspected, they had their expectations of how people behaved. And she had made darn sure, this time, to ring this tree with protection, using not her own power, which she wasn't sure she could rely on, but old tricks her Mom had taught her. Eyes would gloss right over the tree, and past, and she'd not taken a straight path to it in the first place. Right now she blessed her crazy Mom and Dad, as she "settled," into relative comfort, far away from where the creek flowed, and rested.

As frustrating as it was to attempt tracking the girl, Miranda was secretly thrilled at how difficult Andrea was being. The silver-haired shifter now kept track of three trails, the one Andrea forged and obscured, the one that was her sense of Andrea's true direction, and the trail of the other huntress.

And yes, Miranda was aware that at some point between the beginning and now, she had become a huntress, that her impulses relating to Andrea, while in one very great sense was pure, were also now very primal. She was as involved with this pursuit as any she'd ever been in any hunt during her life; more-so.

Her sense of the writer's movement had changed, stalled. It either meant that she was losing track, unlikely, or that Andrea's inner resources, as amazing to discover that they were as profound as they were, had waned and she'd stopped to rest. This was the cause of most ends of the Hunt, the bone weariness that came from the everlasting pursuit, as shifter endurance was a long-lived and constant thing. It was an inevitability that Andrea must stop and thus would be found again. Miranda proceeded with haste, knowing that shifters were not long stymied by cleverness and the dead one's mate had a very serious motivation.

Andy woke with a start; not because she heard any distinctive noise or because her senses had run an alarm, but because she'd been sleeping in brief shots to begin with. With no watch, she had no idea how much time actually passed, but she'd been tracking the night sky and could make a guess. She'd planned a very limited time to rest and the stars had moved enough that she knew it was time to go again.

She kept her movements careful, quiet. She drank from the canteen, feeling almighty grateful for it, and ate one of the energy bars. She left the litter in the tree, regretting the necessity, but every little crinkle and rustle was a possible give away. She'd already guessed that the creatures had preternatural senses. It explained so many things about Miranda, how she could clack down a hallway one moment, always in perfect balance, yet when she wanted to, appear right at one's shoulder without sound. How she always knew how to find Andrea, or anyone else for that matter. It wasn't just that she had great assistants, though now Andrea had to wonder who among the staff were also like Miranda, it was that the editor was someone "other."

It should have put Andrea off, but all it did was stir her more; and she wondered, in the way that a tired, wandering mind could go, how far that silver went and if, when Miranda changed, it covered her all the way.

Oh, she could not be thinking about this now. She had business to take care of, a full bladder, again. And the need to obscure the scent of it. The need to plan a route, even if there was no particular direction to go, except away.

She had a possibility, but wasn't entirely trusting of it. When she'd finally taken to the trees, she'd spotted something that looked like it might be a spire, far, far in the distance. It might be civilization, or it might be a rocky outcrop, but either way... it was her only hope at this point.

She would head toward it and think positive, but she had to admit, she had left her usual sunny disposition far behind her.

They were all heading in the same direction now. While Andrea's obvious pathways continued to play at random, her actual direction caused Miranda's hair to stand on end. While it wasn't back toward the preserve, it was someplace equally dangerous; her home, her village, her people. Who had taken it upon themselves to capture her Andrea because of a mistaken notion and had no compunction about what they would do to Marked Prey, which was anything and everything.

And for some reason, now, the mate was no longer being distracted by the misdirections. She was on an equally straight path toward Andrea. Or the compound. Like herself, she probably guessed that once Andrea discovered its existence, she would be bound to try.

The hopeful ones, the one's never hunted before, always did head for civilization, once they thought they'd spotted it.

Miranda could no longer let herself lag behind. She pushed forward.

Children.

Of course there were children.

Andrea held very still, watching as the little ones scrambled and laughed and played in a green, well groomed field as if they were on a playground; which they probably were. They weren't alone either, adults watched them with care and smiles. Behind them was a small quaint town, one she'd seen in illustrations of fairy-tale books. And behind the town, shielded by great walls and probably more town, was a castle.

Even as she looked at the solidity of that fortress, the laughter of the children called to her; filled her with a wistful longing.

She couldn't do it. She could not bring what followed her, into the midst of the innocent. Not even for her own life.

It didn't take as much effort as she thought it might have, to turn away. That wasn't the part that hurt. It was the realization that she was fighting a losing battle and that they would win, that caused a deepening despair.

However, they hadn't found her yet. Miranda hadn't found her yet.

Andrea had no doubt that she would, even though the cheater had technically caught her first. But... that was only because.. only because he'd lain in wait for some random victim. And Miranda finding her, was all she could think about. She shivered at the thought of what might happen when she did and the thought, while terrifying, sparked another round of need in her.

She might die by the woman's hand, but she would be had first. It wasn't such a terrible fate and, she might have gone willingly, if only...

Her hand pressed protectively again. She had a life to protect, nascent, sure, but hers and while it was hers to guard, she would do so with her whole soul; even if it did ache for what it could not have.

Miranda. How she wished...

"I had hope," she whispered, a remembrance upon her. "My god, I live on it."

Away. She was moving away from the citadel.

Every time Miranda thought Andrea could not surprise her more, she did something new.

In a way, despite her first misgivings, and her terror if one of her people spotted the girl first, she had almost hoped Andrea would try for the chance. Miranda was close enough now, she could have stopped any mayhem cold and simply claimed her right to the girl as Lady of the land. Andrea had proven the ability to survive, which would have bought time and the solution of land-right would have cut the problem of the other shifter's mate almost at the knees. Not that she still couldn't do so, but... a challenge by the mate while on the hunt was legitimate - though they were, technically, a long way from the preserve and far into her territory.

Andrea had gone quite the distance, but at least she'd gone in the right direction. It really was as if she'd known...

Complicated. Everything was always so complicated with that girl.

Again Andrea found herself skidding to a stop for no particular good immediate reason. Yet. Yet, she had come, over the course of the run, and how appropriate she found that designation now, to rely almost entirely upon the intuition of it. She glanced around her immediate surroundings, and, without having to really think about the choice, made for the biggest, broadest tree around, stumbling a little too much to get there. But she was tired, and ached from the inside out. It wasn't all just muscle, but it felt bone deep, blood deep. Her eyes hurt. Her ears hurt. Her teeth and hair hurt. Everything hurt and she was so very afraid.

But the tree called to her, it's branches like welcoming arms, reaching for her. It was like she could see an after image of it.

Her eyes were playing tricks. But she took up the invitation, even if it were her imagination. This time, instead of standing behind tree, she climbed it, achingly, but surely and farther than she ever thought she would have climbed anything a day ago. But these last few hours, trees had been most of her refuge, she'd been up and down, crossing limbs and branches that she shouldn't have been able to, yet they'd carried her weight and she didn't know why she felt safer in those branches, but she did. One thing about abject fear for one's life, it put all the other fears, such as a fear of heights, into the pale, pale distance. Priorities.

She went very high, but not so high she could not see, and then she went as still as the tree itself. She was grateful for the breeze, which cooled her some, but not really effectively. She knew she was running a fever and knew that was affecting some of her choices. She hadn't been near as able call upon those resources in herself that had allowed her to get as far as she had and she was having more difficulty calling up the other tricks she knew.

Someone, was very near to finding her, and she didn't have much fight left.

She sat on the branch and let herself lean against the wide trunk of the tree. She didn't bother with trying to make it so she could get away faster. Fast was out of her physical vocabulary just that moment. Upright might be too, but she could fake it for the moment.

The tips of her ears itched and tingled, as if they wanted to point and twitch in a particular direction.

In the bad ol' days she would have thought that meant that Miranda was near, but...

but...

She closed her eyes.

It wasn't impossible any more, was it?

After she left New York, she'd let go of the need to know where Fashion queen was, but here, in this forest and on strange terrain...

Miranda had been chasing her. She'd known that would be the case since she saw her in front of the crowd of revelers, looking good enough to eat. She thought, on occasion she'd even sensed her, but...

Heh. Good enough to eat.

Andy was going to get eaten. And Miranda was going to literally chew on her butt.

She stifled the hysterical giggle with her hand, so it only emerged as a peep, but she couldn't escape facts.

Well, no... they never said anything about eating; or rather not that sort. More like the kind of dining that happened while sexing and then … an end. Which, right now, a part of her longed for. The other part, the part that kept her going, fired in fits and starts.

She was finding it hard to remember why she was running in the first place, except that Miranda had told her to...

No... that wasn't right. Was it?

God she couldn't think and she felt terrible. And she wanted Miranda, even if she was going to be dinner. She wanted her close, because Miranda was so hot, she burned and Andy was already going up in flames.

The tree warned her, rustling unnecessarily, or maybe it was just the wind bouncing around things like normal, but Andy shivered into the present and looked down; just in time to see a very tall woman she didn't know, break through to the tiny open space below her. She was buxom, perfectly shaped, covered in a beautiful russet pelt, which meant she was obviously a shifter.

"Where are you! I know you're here!"

The woman lifted her head, and sniffed, but she really didn't look up. Andy could see that. She watched as the woman dropped her gaze and shifted her glance all around. She leered. "I can smell you! You reek. Human!" She screamed it out, like a primal noise, an act of pure rage. "You killed him! You! Puny! Nothing! Human!"

Andrea did not even bother trying to reply. She'd learned the lesson the first time and kept her mouth shut. Kept her eyes on the woman, who was definitely not Miranda and listened to her rage.

It was the other accusation that broke her silence; the same one that had been thrown at her over and over and over these past few days. And she was pure down to the nubbins tired of it.

Andy didn't exactly fall from the tree. She pushed herself off the limb and dropped. Landing unsteadily on her feet, somehow without breaking anything, and then almost bouncing from the crouch in righteous indignation, hand extended outward in a point.

"I. Did. Not. Betray. Miranda!" She emphasized each word with a jab of her finger in the shaper's direction, though she was nowhere near where she could touch her.

The angry woman's eyes widened, but the state of surprise lasted hardly a second before she rushed at Andy, intending to barrel her down.

Andy moved, though, what impulse led her to turn just so, she couldn't have said. It was that same half-aware intuitive thing that had carried her this last little while, except now it was compounded with a sense of being just off to the side of herself, which couldn't possibly be true, but... Her upper torso and hips turned, and the woman went sailing past. And just as she went past, Andy's fist went out, pretty much all by itself and connected with the side of her jaw. Andy thought the woman's skin went a rather impressive hue of crimson under that fur, but she didn't have much time to think about it, because the shifter righted herself very, very quickly and turned on Andy again.

"You bitch!"

The growl that accompanied the angry slight aimed at Andy's nature caused the brunette's hair to stand on end. Andy, however, wasn't quite done with her point. She shook her hand out to ease the pain from the bruising punch, "I was the one who warned her in Paris. No one else did. No one else bothered to come to her defense. Not that she needed warning. Nor, I guess, defending."

The woman sailed past again, as this time Andy actually physically stepped back, quicker than she might have thought she could, but she wasn't really paying attention. "She already had her ducks in a row, didn't she. Didn't need little ol' me at all." Her foot went out, as she twisted away, and the shifter stumbled over the sudden block. "I was, after all, just a regular jane plain assistant. Just there to do a job. Which, by the way, she told me to do and I was kind of very good at it. And I was loyal. I left Christian in the dust for her."

The shifter's roar was impressively deafening. She turned and ran at Andy again.

The writer dove to the ground, rolled and moved into a crouch, "And, not to put too fine a point on it, but she's the one who … " Andy clenched her lips tight out of habit. She had chosen never to speak of Miranda in the negative if she could help it. She wouldn't start now. "And that doesn't matter, but... the reason I left is that later, in the car, she called us an Us and there so wasn't an Us. At least, not the kind of us I think about when there is an us... and there wasn't going to be an us, so I had to leave. That wasn't betrayal, that was survival. Well, and I was a little upset about Nigel, but I would have gotten over that. I just knew I was not going to get over her."

The shifter leapt and landed and scored a deep gouge along Andy's upper thigh, but the brunette managed an escape again; though this time it was with a wail of pain. "Shit that hurt. What is it with you people and blood?"

"Oh, I'm going to bring you pain. You have no idea how much blood and pain is in store for you, Human. I'll take you apart, one piece at a time and... god, you smell delicious. How dare you!"

"They all say that. I can't help what I smell like. I've never really thought about it. Oh, and my name is Andy. If you're going to cuss and try to kill me, you might as well use my name." Andy sprinted backward, somehow keeping her footing, but she did not go far. She didn't have far in her any more.

"Never. You have no name, prey. You don't deserve it!"

"Look, I am sorry about your boyfriend, but he came at me, not the other way around."

The scream tore from the woman's throat. "He was my mate!"

Andy understood, intuited really, that was a deep thing, though she couldn't know the reason why. She also knew that what she said next was likely to really get her killed, but couldn't stop her mouth. And even if she were right, it was a cold thing to say and she was going to feel bad about it later; much, much later. "Then he should have been with you, not skulking about in the forest waiting for his next innocent victim!"

The woman eyes flared with a hellish light and Andy saw her death in them. Then the woman began to transform again, taking a shape that was all too reminiscent of really gory horror movies; with lots of teeth, and inhuman features and the sound of bones cracking and growing, fur and eyes changing colors and shape and lips gone far too wide at the mouth.

A peep that had nothing to do with laughter escaped the writer and Andy began backing away, faster and faster, before turning. And she realized, maybe she did have a little run left in her.


	5. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 4

**TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt. 4**

She had no particular direction to go, except away from the innocents. It was as if Andy had a second wind; well, more like a seventh wind, but still, she felt energized for the moment. She recognized it was probably an illusion of energy and she did not know where it was being drawn from, but fear gave figurative wings to her feet.

What she really wanted was water. She wanted to plunge into the cool, blessed relief of it, just for a moment - even with the beast at her back. She needed it.

She wasn't bothering with watching where she was going, she was just going. Somehow the branches and leaves and everything that had stumbled her during that first chase by the shifter male, now seemed to work with her, rather than against.

Now and then, she'd feel the sharp sting of a branch, but it was as if the ground and the green were spurring her on, trying to keep her awake. Still, she knew she had cuts from the unavoidable strikes, which only meant that the creature behind her, which she would catch in flashing glances or could hear as it chased her - still swearing, but now at a terrible, terrifying volume, could smell her even better.

It was as if the trees and brush wanted her to bleed.

Either that or she was so tired now, she wasn't really aware of where she was going; which was the more likely scenario. Yet, her mind, which was a constant whirl, sought reasons for the unreasonable.

She turned turned sharply, noting that she was striding up yet another incline. But it only rose a little bit before falling off in a long slope down. She let it carry her, praying for no holes, no surprises, just the ground beneath to hold her, because she could not afford a fall now.

She slid part of the way down, but her feet didn't twist, so she was grateful; even more so, when she heard, past the pounding of her heartbeat and the slap of the canteen and the blanket roll against her hip, the sound of water, moving.

She threw herself in that direction, not caring that swimming was such a very bad idea right now. She wasn't a fast swimmer, she wasn't even a fast slog-through-the-water runner, but she needed the cool, needed the water to cover some part of her body; all of it, if she could.

She wound a path, following the growing sense of cool before her, until she was at the rise of a small cliff. Below her, edged a good three fourth of the way around, at least, by the rocky face, was a pool. Across from her was a small waterfall, spring-fed, which spilled into the pool.

She could have cried for the grace of it and only barely resisted the urge to plunge herself over the cliff to reach it. That, she knew, would have been madness, but she was right on the cracked edge of madness anyway.

She made tracks, following the incline, keeping the pool, if not in sight in mind. She knew she was likely trapping herself; she knew that she wasn't that far ahead of the angry mate of the dead man, but she had to.

She didn't take off her shoes or clothes, or even the canteen. She barely remembered to lift the blanket roll above her head and off, to keep it dry. She let the roll drop on some bare rock and then she walked in, no caution and all splash, going as deep as she could as fast as she could, biting back the scream at the pain of the cool wet against her much too-hot skin.

It hurt. It hurt so much to get into that water.

But she knew, almost immediately, it was the right thing, the thing she'd had to do.

She stayed under, as long as she could hold her breath, perhaps just a few beats longer, before erupting out of the water and fast catching another breath. She went down again, just as deep, holding for as long as she could and then up. This time, even as water streamed about her face, she tried to take in the sights around, to guess at how much time she had. But she didn't linger over it. The mate would have to catch her. She had to stay in the water, just a little longer.

She ducked in again, blessing the relief that finally, finally threaded through her.

She stayed a little longer than she should have and knew it, but it was almost as much agony to leave the pool as it was to get in it. However, she forced her body to move, forced herself to rise from the water and walk toward toward the shore.

She brushed back the water from her face, pushed back her hair and luxuriated in the heavy coolness of the t-shirt and jeans. Not so much the shoes, but... even there... relief. She tugged at the wet strip of cloth, the one she'd used to wipe her face earlier, and pulled it out of the jeans and tied her hair back in a ponytail. The cloth, no doubt, would shrink some, but if she lived, she'd cut it off if she had to. Heck, right now she'd cut her hair off if she thought it would help.

By the time she splashed to the rock where the bedroll lay, she felt, if not totally refreshed, at least less like she would implode. She still hurt, but that ungodly heat had eased back considerably and the fever, while probably not broken, no longer hazed her vision.

She picked up the blanket and slung it on her back, then she trudged to where the waterfall spilled, its white crests bubbling and splashing into the pool. She moved the canteen and uncapped it, stuck it under one of the larger streams of the fall and let it fill.

She was aware she should rush, aware that time was limited, but could not push herself to any more speed at the moment. This was as good as she could do.

She heard a great howl, not very far at all, and knew that the shifter was very close. She drew back the canteen and capped it, trusting that the filter would do its work. Then she looked out toward the pathway that would take her away from the spring, away from trees near the spring, and towards even more running. It was so, so very hard to even consider going.

She wanted to go back into the water, just for a little longer. She compromised, by throwing her hands into the rushing water and then thrusting that water onto her face. It felt awesome, but she did not do it again.

She puffed air through her mouth, as temptation to strip and get into the water nearly overwhelmed her. "Get a grip, Andy. As long as you're alive, you've got a chance, but stop here, and you're likely dead. Keep going."

Demand to herself made, the writer pulled away from the small refuge and made her way towards the trees and their shelter. She smiled, despite herself, as the branches seemed to reach for her again and shook off that sense of double vision that had been trailing her since the , unaware of the soft green grass growing and cushioning her shell-shocked feet, she moved silently back into the shadows of the forest, without looking back.

Miranda clearly heard the howl of frustration of the dead man's mate. It was very close. She grinned, despite herself. It was apparent that Andrea had become difficult again. It seemed that the land just favored the younger woman. It was such an unexpected development, and she found herself, at the last, agreeing with the early sentiments expressed previous to the Hunt's start. Andrea was a prize for any who caught her.

Which made the presence of the dead man and the man's mate even more irksome, because neither of them had a right to Andrea. The one who'd spoke of the girl as a toy had more right because they would have gone through the whole pursuit, not that they would have endured. One who thought of prey as toys tended to seek the easy Mark.

Miranda had puzzled over the location of the other woman's beginnings and had arrived at the conclusion that she too must have taken early shelter previous to the hunt in preparation of the chase and, as they were not villagers of her land, which might have added a kind of permission, if Miranda was so inclined to give it, and they were not participants at her party, they neither of them had any legitimate reason for being on the preserve.

True, the Mark of the Hunt gave certain permissions, but neither of the shifters should have been on this particular hunt in the first place.

And it really irritated Miranda that they had been laying in wait for her prey; her Andrea. Even though they had no idea that Andrea would be their first encounter, or should not have known it anyhow. A low hum of a growl snarled past her lips, one not large enough to break a long distance silence, but enough to indicate her mood.

She might be empathetic with the mate's suffering, but neither of them would have been damaged thus if they'd followed the protocols of the hunt. Miranda would have been the first to find Andrea and that would have been that. It was perhaps arrogant of her to think it, given how the younger woman held her own in the pursuit, but she knew it was also true and she felt no personal compunction to avoid the conflict that was sure to come.

Miranda shifted, finally, changing from her human form to one that was taller and stronger, though still bipedal. The clothes she was wearing tore under the change, and the discards littered the forest floor to become nesting material for small animals prone to such things. The thought of a hedgehog making a nest out of bits of La Perla curled another brief grin on Miranda's lips and then she shot forward, like moonlight.

One would think that a white or silver pelt would be very hard to hide, but alphas had very particular gifts and features and white pelts brought their own gifts too. The combination was very powerful. Miranda was nearly invisible to all the senses, except, to those who were already connected in some way to her. Her children could find her, but it was a very rare individual who else might. If Miranda did not wish to be found, she simply wasn't.

She streaked through the forest, anxious and feral, biting back regret that was weighted with years of hind-sight proved foolishness. She should have gone after the girl after Paris. That much was apparent. Pride, however, would not let her. Or so she'd justified at the time. It was one of many justifications, including the belief that Andrea was a mere mortal and incapable of understanding things beyond her world and scope - an idea she'd thought proven by how long it had taken Andrea to adapt to Runway.

How wrong could a woman be? It was a self-castigation, unusual because Miranda so very rarely was wrong.

But no one could do what Andrea was doing now and be ignorant of the greater world. And, as much as she'd disagreed with the shifter who had challenged human capability to transition, she was also aware that so many in the past had given up long before the next morning rose.

Andrea, meanwhile, appeared to be going strong.

And perhaps her greatest regret of the moment, not related to the past at all, was that she'd convinced herself to wait for the call of the hunt, rather than immediately pursuing the girl and rescuing her before the mayhem even began.

She should have. She really should have.

But, in the dark part of her heart, she realized she had retained an anger at Andrea leaving and she had wanted to hunt the girl. She had wanted to scent her blood in the wind, and to feel her fright and hone in on her in the dark.

She wanted to overpower her, to show her the beast; the one in her that absolutely craved Andrea. It was need, not mere want, which spurred Miranda.

And she dreaded the possible results.

The hunt, however was on and she was as driven by it as any other of the People now.

Andrea stared up the cliff face in disbelief. She looked to the right and the left and then back, and wondered, truly, how she'd managed to get to this point. One moment, she seemed to be in the zone, somehow wending her way through the forest with a surprising alacrity for someone who was mostly fast walking. But then, she must have made a wrong turn somewhere, which now felt quite impossible.

And why she thought that was true, she could not have said.

The cliff went up and up and it was wide, very wide, like some divinity or giant had arbitrarily set a wall down. Cognitively, she knew the cliff ended. After all, she'd paced a good distance and had never run across it. But emotionally, just by looking at it, she felt like it went on forever. This, she guessed, had to be a demarcation of a boundary and she could guess what it meant. But she also knew it probably wasn't impossible to scale, just it would take a horrendous amount of effort.

She stared up and thought about climbing and abruptly felt overwhelmed. In a weird way, it should have been more than overwhelming. She should have also been feeling all the aches and pains and things that made a person groan, but she felt oddly good for a person who had been mostly on their feet and going through what she had been. However, that didn't mean she did not know trouble when she saw it.

She guessed the good feeling was runner's endorphins, finally kicking in. But she honestly could not convince herself that going up that sheer wall-face was any sort of great idea. The area to her left, was dense with foliage, and not the kind that was friendly. Thorns abounded. The area to her right was somewhat open, but then it too closed off in a wall of brush and thorn and leaves and sundry bits that just seemed to glower at her.

Impossible notion. She was still a bit woozy, she was sure.

Her only choices were to go back, which was looking more and more likely even though it meant getting closer to the really angry might-have-also-been-a-wife mate, and risking life and limb. Or, climbing, which also meant risking life and limb, as well, and, frankly, she didn't want to do it.

Andrea turned and looked back at the path she'd taken and made her decision, hoping it was the right one.

It wasn't quite backtracking, but once started, Andrea was glad she'd gone back. She found another path, one less intimidating and "wrong-feeling," and she paced it steadily. The only problem was, that the further she went, the less forest cover there seemed to be and that actually made her feel uncomfortable.

She did not see that she had much choice however, so she kept on, secretly wondering if she might be circling back around somehow. She had no real way to tell, after all, unless she ran into that village again, the lake or the place where she'd started. She couldn't even trust the direction of the sun, as, even though it seemed like it might her sun, it also might not.

All she had were common root ideas of direction - certain kinds of plants grow in certain kinds of directions, pick one point and follow, and if she'd had a map, she might have been able to dink about with a compass as a guide, but she didn't think to look for that when she'd gone digging through the dead man's pack and the tiny survival tin didn't have one.

About the time she was considering the need for a break, she felt a chill roll up her spine and spread across her shoulders. She unconsciously paused and looked back. In the shadows, she saw a pair of mad, gleaming gold eyes. The growl, one she'd kind of gotten to know, tripped its way back down her spine and she felt her belly drop in response and not in a pleasant way.

"Well. Crap."

They'd gone the distance, and the shifter had finally found her.

Andy turned slowly, considering whether she really ought to try running, but recognized that moment was over. She raised her hand placatingly. "It doesn't have to be this way."

The growl just lengthened and a great paw stepped out of the shadow and landed with a solid thud on the ground. It was followed by another fore-paw.

"My," Andy trembled, "What big paws you have." She offered a very weak smile and took a step back.

The shifter's lips curled into a wicked grimace, one that displayed white teeth and dripping saliva of doom.

"And... big teeth," Andy said, slightly mournfully, wincing as, in sympathy with what those kind of teeth were capable of, her shoulder suddenly twinged powerfully. She hissed the pain out, but took another step back. She let one hand drop to the knife at her side. Her voice shook, "I don't want to hurt you, but I will defend myself."

She had to, absolutely.

More of the shifter's body revealed itself and Andy realized the creature had actually grown taller and wider during the chase. The writer gulped, but slid the knife from its sheath as the growls had not ceased at all, but had rather gotten deeper and more threatening.

She tried to remember whether looking into the eyes was a good thing or bad thing, then realized she had no way of knowing.

And she knew she could not symbolically submit. She couldn't afford to take the chance of what the consequences might be with this ravening mad-thing. She kept her eyes up and on the creature.

She thought about apologizing, again, then discarded the notion. Though the degree of passion, of ire present in the mate spoke to Andy and she felt a deeper empathy than she'd been prepared for, she also had a feeling that no words would ever suffice.

It was no one particular thing, but Andy felt it before it happened, like a whisper on the wind. The creature leapt, with an earnest death-to-Andrea look in its eyes. Andy didn't even have time to step away or duck. She managed to lift her arm, felt the creature's hot breath sweep across her fore-arm, and heard the snapping sound of teeth. Then there was a sharp, disjointed and startled yelp of agony; not her own.

She dropped her arm in astonishment and self-preservation and found herself staring goggle-eyed at an ongoing battle. A part of her mind, the ever analytical part, considered it slightly odd that nothing was actually blurry. On TV when things went at the speed that she was witnessing, they utilized a digitized blur effect, to indicate the path being taken that was so quick the eye could not possibly follow. Yet, as she watched events unfold that were happening at least as fast, she seemed to see every motion, every step and bite and terrifying bloodletting in its pure dreamlike and technicolor form. Blood splashed the ground and tree and teeth gnashed and fist and claws hammered at each other. And the two creatures, one bipedal and one trying to shift that way, oppositional in coloration, and divergent in height by a great margin, tumbled over and over.

Andy gripped the handle of the knife very hard, as if that somehow was more solid and real than what she was seeing, but she could not dissuade herself of the reality and she couldn't form the words to even describe it to herself.

Then, suddenly, as if one last turn around or swipe to the jaw was all it took, things between the combatants went still. The smaller, silver-haired form, was on top, foot to the creature's neck, both hands twisting a massive fore-arm back sharp enough to break it. And sure enough, Andy heard a vicious crack as bone and ligament tore.

"Mine." The word was hardly spoken loudly, but the tone...

Andy would have recognized that anywhere and she felt a new kind of shiver run up her spine and down again. The hairs on her body stood up, and she nearly stepped forward, nearly dropped the knife to reach out.

"My Hunt. Mine!"

The broken creature whined and tried to buck and push the other away, but all that did was cause the silver shifter to angle herself differently. She dropped the mangled, useless arm, and reached down with one hand, claws out and pointed, until she was touching the other creature's already well-dented face. She dug in and the creature wailed.

Andy stilled like a deer caught in headlights, as the words impacted. Her belly constricted, tight with heat and anguish. She darted looks around herself, trying to keep the two combatants squarely in view, while assessing the area for a chance to leave, to go while there was a distraction. For once the trees and the shadows and the ground or the sky held no clue for her.

"Submit." It was a command and for a moment, Andy thought it was directed at herself. But the silver shifter's attention wasn't on her at all, or so it seemed.

The russet shifter moaned. For a moment Andy thought she might actually give in, but then, there was a blistering roar and the creature bounced herself, one more time, trying to shake off the other one. She turned and lifted her head, snapping out.

Despite herself, Andrea screamed in a sudden terror. It was not fear for herself.

The silver haired shifter's change was so abrupt, Andy almost missed the whole of it, but she didn't miss the flash-fire azure eyes and perfectly shaped and pointed white teeth and the way they rent the throat of the russet shifter without any hesitation at all.


	6. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 5

**TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt. 5**

The silver shifter stood upright. Even in this broader, taller shape, Andrea knew. It wasn't just the incredible blue eyes or the shape of her body, which Andy had, despite herself, memorized. She knew Miranda, in many ways, forward and backward, though she'd never seen her nude. But she had guessed and ratios remained consistent. Plus, there was a proof. The signature lock of white hair drifted across the other woman's forehead. It was one of the few spots unblemished by the fight. A bright crimson covered Miranda from her mouth on down to her chest and a little further, in trickles down her belly and thighs. Her eyes held a ferocious gleam as she casually wiped her face with the back of her hand, which hardly helped at all, but caused Andy to focus less on the amount of the stranger's blood covering the shifter, and more on all the terrible, deep scores along the woman's flesh.

Dazed by the swift resolution of the fight, Andy fought for some composure and absolutely did not find it. She did more than tremble, she shook. Her grip on the knife remained firm, but the blade itself was nearly twanging with how hard it was wobbling. So many things were going through her mind; the desire to escape, the relief that dead man's mate had been stopped, and the very disturbing rush of need and attraction she'd felt when she'd realized who had come to her almost rescue.

She reminded herself she was prey, that this was not a lucky break. But watching Miranda fight for her and win... She felt a pulse of heat and want curl from her head to her feet and warm all the parts in between. Parts of her had already flexed in receptivity and she'd had to fight back the urge to move forward when the battle was done.

That's when she realized the shakes were not entirely fear. She was fighting herself, fighting hard to keep common sense. This woman, she knew, was an even worse danger than the mate had been.

Even as she was forcing herself to slowly step back, she ached at the wounds she saw on Miranda, wanted to soothe her, but did not dare. "You're hurt. You're really hurt."

Miranda stepped casually over the body, nearly daintily, and as she did, she changed, returning to her normal height and size. The fur retreated, but her hands still seemed to have claws. Or else, Miranda had taken to wearing really long nails, which was unlikely. After all, she did write her own editorials. Again, Andrea was impacted by the surreality of the moment. The wounds on the editor remained, but now seemed less horrid or at least, not so vast. She realized that Miranda was healing very quickly, just like that other shifter had been. Andy moved back a few more steps, watching for a moment of inattention. Miranda's gaze never wavered and her expression narrowed.

"Do. NOT. Run. Andrea." Miranda enunciated every word. And the familiar use of her version of Andy's name did all sorts of things to the younger woman's already racing heart. Miranda's expression was sharp, but her teeth were even sharper.

"Then don't follow me," Andy choked out. Even now, covered in blood, Miranda was astonishingly beautiful. She was also very, very intimidating.

"Ah, but I must. And you know it."

"I'm your hunt," Andy whispered.

"Yes." Miranda acknowledge coolly, but she stopped pacing toward the younger woman.

"I didn't betray..." Andrea started, trying at first to defend herself. Then she swallowed, and also coming to a halt. And realized she wanted to say something else entirely. "When I left, I didn't mean to … hurt you... if I did. I … "

"Do you really think I want your apology? Or need it?"

The chill words cooled Andy's ardor a little, because there really was only one answer and that way led down a bloody path. That almost brought her mind and self-control back. Almost. "I thought maybe..."

"Saying you're sorry won't stop what is going to happen, Andrea. It won't change what needs to be done. Your need to be absolved has nothing to do with anything that has gone on."

Andrea's expression tripped along the edge of crumpling. She stepped back, despite herself as very sensible fear suddenly threaded through her veins.

"My control is very thin at the moment. You won't like what happens if you run right now." Miranda paused and inhaled, as if she couldn't help it. When she looked back, it was as if her blue eyes were fire. "Then again, perhaps _you_ might."

Andrea struggled not to reply, but a part of her was stung by the sense that she was being slurred, accused. "I can't help that my body does this. I can't help the way I smell. It's not... It's not an open invitation..."

A small chuff of a near-laugh escaped Miranda and she had the grace to answer. "Oh, but it is so very inviting. And I do think you would say yes..." She took a deeper breath, a fiercer inhale and then growled. "Or at least, not no."

"I can say no. I have."

Before Andy could move, Miranda was much closer. How did she do that? "Ah, but you've surely invited someone to yourself, recently, haven't you?" She began to slowly circle around the younger woman and as Andy started to follow her, trying to keep her eyes on her, she raised a finger of warning. The writer wisely stopped.

"Are you asking me if I've slept with someone?"

"No. I'm telling you. A girl like you, does not go long without admirers, but your most recent assignation was not so long ago... I can always tell."

"I... what? How can..."

Miranda shrugged. "I am what I am, and I always could. I always knew. I could smell it on you. You always were... quite tasty."

Despite herself, Andrea felt a flush roll across her face and resisted the urge to cover her face with her free hand. "Oh my god."

Miranda paused just to the side of Andrea, staring at her like she was something to be investigated. "There's something... different, in your scent today Andrea. You're not wearing perfume." The shifter's expression was puzzled, dangerous.

"It's the terror. I'm pretty sure of it."

"No. That's not it." She stepped closer, but as she did, the writer stepped back. Miranda's voice was a caution, a terrible purr of warning, which caused the younger woman's pulse to jump, "Andrea."

"I can't, Miranda. I … can't believe what it is I want to do. No. That's a lie and I don't want to lie to you. I think... you know now what is true. Any other day and... I might have just let this run its natural course. My life... my body... would be yours. No one else compares. They never have, but I couldn't have you then and now ... I can't let you have me ... not when I know what happens next. What they've all told me will happen next, even if I surrendered. I can't not run. It's one thing if you catch me, but I have more than me to consider. I … Am I ever going to stop wanting you?" Despair colored the never spoken before admission, threaded with the wholesale physical weariness Andy felt. She'd closed her eyes during her confession, unable to stand knowing how weak she sounded, and thus missed the flash of passion in the older woman's expression. "Miranda. I don't have a choice in this."

"Oh, Andrea. Surely you've learned by now you always have a choice."

"Not this time, Miranda. I was kidnapped. I wouldn't... I wouldn't have been here otherwise. My choice... My choice was to go home after my appointment. I needed to go home. And now... now my choice has to be to live."

"Then wait. Andrea. Rest a moment." Miranda stepped back one step and then another and came around to where the writer to could see her. "Wait until I tell you to go."

Andrea stared at the woman who had been part of her dreams for so long. And, she didn't know what made her trust her, especially given the gore and all the reasons to run screaming. But she took her first free breath in the last few minutes. The knife suddenly felt heavy in her hand.

"Why don't you put that away. You won't need it with me. And you certainly won't use it on me."

"You can't know that."

Miranda cocked a brow and the familiarity of the moment caused Andy's shoulders to settle, as if some long ago Pavlovian response had kicked in just because Miranda was acting like herself. Andy sheathed the knife and felt even calmer than she had moments ago.

For a moment, silence was their companion; not necessarily a pleasant one, but at least not threatening. Andrea's adrenaline shocked shivers eased and her eyes, while still frightened, reflected back her usual intelligence. Miranda considered what to say to the younger woman. There were things that needed saying, after all.

"I did not ask for this."

Andrea jerked, as if startled, and then exhaled. "But..."

"It is possible for minions to be... too loyal, I think."

"Or they just had it out for me. Is Emily...?" The question drifted, unformed because she really didn't want to know.

Miranda pushed back a laugh. "No. She is not. Though she has her talents."

Andrea eased again, as if, somehow, Emily being the cause would have been a step too much. "Good. Because I sent her all those clothes... I mean I..."

"I am aware." She had, after all, seen almost every outfit. It was what, in the last, had finally convinced Miranda that Andrea had found her own style. She'd mourned that she had not been able to truly observe its evolution after. The rags the woman wore now, torn jeans and a t-shirt and nearly destroyed tennis-shoes, were no true indication.

She let her eyes travel the younger woman's form, taking in every scratch, the favoring of wounds, and her beautiful shape. Again that scent wafted pass, making her belly clench and her mouth water.

It was then than she pegged what the difference was, had to be. It was a lightening chain reaction that bled fear and anger through her bones. She saw Andrea stiffen in reaction to the alteration in her demeanor, but it didn't really register.

She'd not quite tackled the girl, but Andrea was on her knees before Miranda had truly thought about what she was doing. She held Andrea's chin in her grip, unable to keep it from being painful, claws digging a little, but not enough to bleed. Yet. She stared directly into those brown eyes gone dark with heat and terror.

"Whose is it?" How could anyone have let this happen? They knew the rules. They knew the why of the rules. It was a fundamental ethic of the People. Her grip tightened when she spotted stubbornness coloring the younger woman's expression, and she said, "Be very careful how you answer, girl."

Yes, the answer was very, very important. If what she thought... no, knew... was true... Andrea should never have been brought to the preserve, made to run. A pregnant woman was always off the board. The People who did the capturing were always obligated to ascertain the status of the prey first. That was part of their job. No harm to Pups, the truly innocent, even human ones, even nascent, barely there... Andrea mentioned an appointment. "You mentioned an appointment?"

Outrage upon Outrage.

Oh, the punishings that would be meted out...

But first she had to deal with Andrea, who was full of indignation. Ah. Unexpected and oddly reassuring. "Girl! I am not a girl. I haven't been a girl since I was sixteen. I was in my twenties when we first met. I wasn't a girl then. It's been nearly a decade. Definitely not a girl now..."

Something about the way those eyes flared, which reminded Miranda of tales from long ago and she was reminded of a thought she'd had about Andrea, about the claims that this girl was a "mere" human. Some things, some creatures were myth. But Miranda knew that myths were often founded in some sort of truth.

A clawed fingertip barely caressed the outline of Andrea's ear. The mild point, which had been nearly invisible to the eye, seemed to sharpen and blush at her touch in erotic response. Miranda offered a shark's grin, setting aside the misdirection for a moment to query, "Are you very sure of that?"

Andrea shivered at the tone. All her senses were on high alert. She tried to reason her way out, but Miranda's proximity was busting her resolve to toughen up; to even think. "Miranda..."

"How far along are you? And I still want an answer."

"It's not yours, so why does it matter and... I … only a few was a doctor's appointment. Just to confirm and get told to rest ... How can you smell the difference of a few weeks, Miranda. That's..."

"Because its you. I know your scent inside and out. I know what you smell like scared, confident or turned on. And this... is new. And I want to know." Her words were clipped, skirting the edge of envy, jealousy. "If nothing else, I can see that you're returned to your … mate." The word ground out, was hamburgered in distaste.

Andrea choked a laugh. "I don't have anyone Miranda. I never... since Nate, there's not ever been anyone around me that long. And I didn't want anyone else, but..." She looked straight into Miranda's eyes and then away. "I... don't even know, who it is. He just... he had blue eyes. Never like yours. They never are quite right. Though I look and look. The last one had a nose that reminded me..." Again with the embarrassing admissions. Andy closed her eyes as the pressure on her jaw eased. "The doctor... we tried artificial insemination, but... my body kept rejecting it. I've tried so hard, Miranda. To keep them. But..."

"Andrea..." The grip smoothed out, softened, if not loosed. A wealth of empathy graced her name. Her next question was gentle. "How long... how long have you been trying?"

"A year and a half or so. I … just needed." That was a terrible understatement. The need for Miranda and a child had been immensely strong, a veritable compulsion that drove her fiercely at the beginning - to the point of almost heading back to New York to throw herself in front of Miranda and beg. She'd held off by the skin of her teeth, but once the baby-need started, her instincts carried the impulse and ran. As she could not have Miranda, she'd pursued having a child with an almost single-minded focused determination.

Miranda nearly stepped back as the full impact of the timing hit. It was her fault. She was the reason why. And Andrea, even at the distance of hundreds of miles, was very psychic about her. Miranda had barely managed to keep her legs closed for those long, torturous six weeks. Her human side retained the monthly possibility, but every few years, the shifter dominated. And this last time, Andrea... had picked up and run with it, because... she was a very particular kind of magic. And her true mate. God help them both. She should have just gone after her...

The editor offered a half answer, as if it were all that she understood. "It was time."

"Yes."

"You've been bitten Andrea." She knew that the younger woman was smart enough to understand the implications, even without whatever sparse explanations had been given during the Mark of the Hunt ceremony the prey might, or might not have, received.

"I know." The words were nearly inaudible.

"What are you, Andrea?" Miranda knew, or thought she did, but she wanted to hear it anyway.

Habit kept Andrea from answering the real question. "A writer. Me. I don't..."

"Andrea," Miranda loosed younger woman's jaw, but only so she could cup her face. The brunette didn't even flinch at the claws. In fact, she leaned into the touch. "Try again. Tell me about your family."

"I don't know what there is to tell? I have a Mom and Dad and siblings and I have Uncles and Aunts and cousins. Lots and lots of cousins." That started the ramble, as she thought, once again, of the injustice... "The women in my family are usually easily fertile. We won't go into what goes on with the men. Never a miss in the bunch, but not me. Oh no... It has to be difficult. None of them really understand. Well, except Dorene, who says there is a reason, but... Miranda, there shouldn't be a reason. When we want to get pregnant, we do. When we don't, we simply don't ..." The implication that they could control their biology was there, but Andy sense that she'd come close to saying a few home truths and she slowed. Her eyes drifted to Miranda's lips, which were disturbingly close.

"Tell me. What you are."

"I'm just me. I'm just..."

"I thought you said you did not want to lie to me..."

Andrea looked stricken. "I've been lying, no... hiding... for years, Miranda. It's very hard..."

"I know." A thumb brushed her cheek gently, just under her eye. The older woman's voice was very gentle. She smelled like copper and salt, blood, and herself. "You know a secret of mine. Isn't only fair to share one of yours?"

Andy could have made a fair argument about how she'd attained that secret, but... The words spilled out in a tumble, fast, so she couldn't withdraw them. "I'm a writer. I am a very good writer. I have a nom de plume."

"Yes. You are. That is no secret. And?"

The softness of the affirmation nearly undid the younger woman. "You read my work."

"As often as I can. You surely knew I kept tabs. Don't stop Andrea. Tell me."

"I don't know if I can. It's not something we talk about. Ever. Usually we have to be found. It's a thing..."

"Haven't I found you?"

Andrea blinked at her, and a small gasp escaped. Her affirmation was a soft moan. "Yes. You have."

"Tell."

It was a relief. At last she had been found, though not yet captured. "I'm a Nymph. A demi-god. Pureblood. But even so, I..." A form of shame caused her to blush, but she had always been reassured she had nothing to be ashamed about. Her lack was not her fault. Just a flaw. "... am not bound by a particular place, like many other of my kind. Most."

"But you..." Confusion entered Miranda's vision. "Even so, how could you even tolerate being at..." She nearly said _Runway_, but did not finish the question. Did not have to, really.

"New York has a very big park. But that was never a problem for me. Water comes from faucets, and I make sure to keep plants and..." she exhaled some of her pain away. "And my family never expected me to stay. For what I lack, I am also freer than most. I could make my own way."

Miranda leaned her forehead against Andrea's. "What a fool I've been."

"Never," Andrea exhaled. "I am the one who left."

"No. Ran. Like the creature that you are. But I was too dense to understand the true message. Too caught up in what I knew of my world to see yours. And now," She laughed a little bitterly, "It's all so very obvious."

"Miranda ..."

"Hush, Andrea."

She did and this time the silence between them, while touched by events, no longer felt like its own kind of fire. They just breathed for a moment, sharing air and the small amount of physical contact they had. Miranda used the time to think, to arrive at conclusions.

Andrea rested, closing her eyes and doing the opposite of thinking or trying to map out her next path.

When Miranda spoke, her voice was very soft, as it always was, but it also held a careful gentleness. "I need you to listen, to pretend, for just a moment that you work for me."

"Okay," husked Andrea.

"You will take off those shoes. They put you at a disadvantage."

"But..."

"Andrea." The younger woman fell silent. Miranda continued. "You will run better without them. And though I sorrow to say it, you do need to run again. I need the time to compose myself, but also, the hunt must finish. It's not fair. It's not right. But it is necessary." Andrea tensed. "You will run in the direction I chase you. If it helps, you have already been there. The waterfall."

"Okay." The delivery of Miranda's pronouncements did remind her a bit of when she was an assistant. The only thing missing was a notepad, but even then... she'd had to just remember a task often enough or to mystically understand some obscure demand and produce a result. It wasn't the delivery of the Harry Potter book that was the miracle. The real kind happened daily. In comparison to that time, however, Miranda was actually providing more information than usual.

"Certain things must happen. The Mark must be changed, but the application will be rough and painful. No way around it. There is this other thing between us and it really is the most effective way, the most immediate, but also permanent. And you must say now... you must say now if you can not, will not, because I will not be able to stop, Andrea. I will have you. Must. But there is no safe word for us. Not this time."

Andrea swallowed. "You can change the Mark."

"I can replace it. I am an Alpha. I have certain abilities and rights ..."

"Oh."

"Yes, oh." Miranda reluctantly pulled away. Her expression was rueful, "It is not always blood and pain with us, so you know."

"I know. I think. I saw the party."

"I had no idea, Andrea that..."

"I know. I understand..."

"I regret that our first... time, shall be as it will be. You spoke of lack of choice... "

Andrea wiped her eyes with her fingertips and offered a breathy, short laugh. "Oh, Miranda, that's actually... My people... The rare..." She blushed... "It's very rare, Miranda, for us to have … It always starts with … You know the stories of the dryads and how the gods chase them and then... take them."

Miranda inhaled sharply, and her heartbeat increase. "Yes," she replied breathily.

"If it's a real... uhm... thing, one that lasts. That's how it starts. That is how it always is. Even when they negotiate how it will be. Nate and I, we weren't like that. I met him in college and we had a few dates and it's how I knew... it wasn't forever. Just for however long. And it hurt when we broke up, but I knew it was inevitable. I just thought it would be longer. My people... I... will live a long time. I liked not being alone. He... disappointed me."

Miranda arched a brow, but offered no comment and no apologies.

It wasn't needed.

Miranda caressed Andrea's face one last time and stepped back. It gave the younger woman a good chance to look at her again. The blood, now dry, had drifted along her torso more, and covered her like a painted shirt, but all the deep and terrible bites and scratches were gone, without even a scar.

The brunette shifted, so she could reach her shoes and she began untying. It was a matter of moments and then she stood, bare feet on the sweet green ground. Shoes laced to the rope and blanket roll that was her current carry-all. She looked at Miranda and then at herself and noted that she was twice as dressed as the silver-haired woman. "Are you sure I shouldn't..."

Miranda's smile was tiny, amused. She shook her head. "No. Leave them for now." They would be gone soon enough. Her hands flexed in anticipation.

"Okay."

Miranda's smile faded and cocked her hip and put one hand on it, striking a classic pose. Then she lifted her other hand elegantly and made a motion that Andrea recognized far too well. "That's all." The hand dropped, as if letting go of a flag.

Andrea stared, a moment longer. Then her expression firmed and she turned in one smooth motion. And ran.


	7. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 6

**TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt. 6**

A long, near-musical howl behind her caused more than Andrea's pulse to jump. Even as her steps skipped a beat, a thrill shivered though her body. It was a mix of emotional flavors, and did, yes, include a touch of fear. But what struck her as oddest was the fact she knew that voice, even though it was not "human" sound at all.

Though Andy had been leery of running without her shoes, the difference in how it felt to run was astonishing. Her steps were more sure, her pace felt unstoppable. She'd been worried about sticks and stones, about sharp intrusions. It wasn't like she had callous, but it was as if her feet always knew where the softest grass grew.

If it weren't for the seriousness of the journey, she might even have enjoyed it. And it did not change, that she was actually weary and had been for a long time. But she ran, if not at full speed, with alacrity.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of white in the shadows and then it disappeared, retreated.

She breathed out, without actually vocalising, "Miranda."

If she had a question about how the shifter would guide her, she found out. If she started the wrong way, she got snarled at and sometimes even out and out startled into going a different way. Miranda would appear, still human in form, but teeth bared and dangerous, right in front of her. Andy would turn on near instinct, and bolt in a direction opposite. As long as she headed the right way, she would catch her in those side glances. Or, because it was Miranda, a rare backward glance, one which Andy never attempted while running from the other two shifters, and yet it made her look oh, so vulnerable; which caused Miranda to push.

And there would be a different kind of awareness, not quite so visible, except now and then in a hint of gleam of the eye or the way she thought she saw Miranda grin, that felt different. She could sense, could feel a rising excitement and tension building, not just in herself, but in Miranda. The silver-haired woman was enjoying the chase and it was a primal thing, a call to the wild parts in Andy. And then there were the noises. Growls would change in intonation, or a howl would sound, and Andy's body responded with trills of need and she secretly hoped to reach that waterfall soon; very, very soon.

The path took a familiar turn much more quickly than she expected. Andy heard the water first and that remembered need for it, picked up her pace. She dug in, perhaps surprising the shifter, but Andy suddenly needed the coolness. The path just opened for her, and she pelted down the final steps, lifting the roll up and off. The pool came into view and she could practically taste the relief.

It wasn't exactly that she forgot Miranda was chasing her, so much as... the refuge... the call of it... pulled so very sharply. She dropped what she held on a sunwarmed stone with careless abandon and was on the edge of making a leap.

She was grabbed from behind, one arm wrapped around, and lifted. Andy yelped despite herself as she felt her feet go off the ground. It was full body contact, back to front. She was carried, in an odd kind of surprise and struggle, forward - exactly where she wanted to go, but not the way she'd expected. The other arm...

She heard the shredding sound before she registered just what was happening. The black t-shirt, which wasn't hers to begin with, was torn, from the neck and straight down the middle; all without those dangerous claws ripping into her skin. The remnant fell to the sides, like an undone sweater, exposing soft breasts and plump, taut nipples.

Water splashed around her and the mere contact of it caused her to cry out. An audience might have thought the scream was one of fun, but it was the result of hot flesh contacting cool water, just like last time.

"I've got you." It could have been a claim, but Andrea heard the reassurance. She simply could not respond to it. She shuddered and cried as Miranda dragged her further into the water, imprisoning her in an uncompromising clasp. Well, perhaps an audience would not have seen fun. They might have seen terror. Or rather, Miranda's People might have seen one thing, while her own another. And Humans would have seen a struggling woman fighting an overpowering capture.

Capture. Oh, she was caught at last. Almost... Almost..

They were both in the water now, chin deep and she knew that her feet would touch the ground, but not yet. Certainly, Miranda's stance was absolutely firm. The corner of her eye caught the drift of color and Andy suddenly understood why the shifter had wanted the pool. Or at least part of the reason.

The other was now apparent too. She must have known Andy was overheating, felt the fever upon her brow.

Andrea felt the release of her jean's snap, the loosening as a zipper was undone. If she thought, for a moment, that the heavy fabric was safe from Miranda's assault, she was mistaken. The pants were torn from her body, just as easily as the shirt had been, and more completely. The only saving grace, was, Andy stilled long enough to watch dirty blue fabric be tossed out of the water to land with heavy splats on the ground.

Then she felt Miranda's hand slide through the waistband of skimpy underwear, from hip to middle and down. Andy gasped as the shifter's free hand cupped her and bucked lightly, instinctively into the grip. "Mine." It was a command and an owning. Not once did she let Andy go.

Andy was loathe to argue, but there was a technicality. "Not yet," she managed.

It wasn't the water, though it was cold enough and eventually it might have happened. No, it was the growl that followed raised the hairs on her body as her skin prickled in response.

A single fingertip moved, and Andy felt the careful slide of claw and flesh brush very, very intimately against her. The writer's hands clasped the arm that grasped her tightly, but she'd been in an everlasting state of excitement since she'd first spotted Miranda, despite the circumstances. All it took was that one sweet stroke and a very sincere burst of pleasure pushed the next shuddering scream. She was bent forward as her body shook out of her control, and the next thing she knew, what was left of the shirt she was wearing disappeared.

As she recovered and was distracted by the sudden absence of a barrier between her back and Miranda's breasts, the final cloth barrier, was destroyed and removed. She was now as naked as Miranda.

The next part was as necessary as the previous, but she took her time. Now that Miranda had information she could use and would. She pulled them down, slowly, giving Andy plenty of time to catch her breath, if she actually needed to, which the editor wasn't quite convinced of, but Miranda might be many things; she was not a water breather. She had to.

So they went under the water together. Another time she might have let go, but she'd understood instinctively that the rules of "capture" required that she hold on. She thought she knew to what point, but for now, this wasn't just about their need for each other.

The water felt good, cleansing. She didn't want any blood from the other shifter to be any part of this. She used sand, carefully scrubbing herself and Andrea, who'd had all sorts of foreign essences on her, and switching hands to hold the younger woman when she needed to. It was quick, but thorough and not too rough, or at least she tried not to let it be. Yet. Though she was not as careful with her claws and had known she'd shocked Andrea when she'd made a very deliberate counter scratch along her wounded thigh and other cuts she'd received; She touched everything except the first Marking bite. That would take a different effort, though this was all, at the moment about the mystical, the symbolic act. It was not about healing. That would also come later.

She knew what she was doing, but Andrea had yet to understand and wouldn't for awhile.

Several small dunkings and emergences later, she knew it was time and she was far more than ready. Her own need pulsed fiercely. The need to be clean had been sated, and her need for Andrea was rising exponentially the longer their bodies remained in contact..

The girl had stopped wiggling in her grasp and was leaning against her, eyes closed.

Miranda's lips quirked. She loved the peaceful way her Andrea looked, but it was time to shake things up.

She moved, and as easy as it had been to carry the brunette into the water, it was easier to take her out of it. This is because she used both hands to carry the girl, one arm slung under her legs and the other supporting her back. She snapped out an order, "You will undo the roll and prepare the blanket."

Before Andrea could respond one way or the other, her feet were on the dry ground and she was being propelled forward. Miranda's hold had shifted and now her hand held the woman by her hair, at the scruff of the neck, tight, without being brutal. But it gave her some leverage and Andrea enough freedom of movement to act in concert with her wishes.

The girl knelt and where she did, grass grew, cushioning her. Miranda somehow doubted that Andrea was aware of this, but it was not the time to point it out. She was doing good to speak in full sentences for what she wanted anyhow.

"Hurry. I want your mouth on me."

Those rough words seemed to catch Andrea like a lightening strike. The girl pitched forward, and wrestled with knots suddenly gone too complicated for her turned on mind, but they undid, finally in her desperate grasp. The small amount of goods the blanket hid, were dumped to the side and it was unfurled with a graceful snap of her arms. The blanket seemed to float to the ground in slow motion, compared to Miranda's sudden urgency, but it eventually settled flat and ready.

They did not bother with smoothing anything out. Miranda all but pushed Andrea onto the blanket and turned her around, pressing her back so she could kneel on one knee and straddle her. Andrea reached out, not un-oblivious to the demand of the pose and the way Miranda's hand gripped her hair. She gripped Miranda's hips with a surprising strength, though, perhaps the shifter should not have been startled at all, and pulled her to meet her lips; and tongue.

This time it was Miranda who gasped, as Andrea began an insistent invasion, stroking her tongue and pushing along the velvet line to the sweetening ruby of her need. The brunette's eyes closed and she hummed into the contact, seeming to drink Miranda up with a burgeoning abandon. It was delicate, persistent, deep and amazing. Andrea drew Miranda's desire in quick delicious strokes, which heightened the fire that had already been blazing in her; ever since she saw Andrea, ever since she started the hunt.

The only thing that kept her from breaking contact from that heated, stirring contact to throw Andrea down, was that the spiral hit hard and fast and took her under. Pleasure thundered through the silver-haired shifter, and she threw back her head, eyes gone icy-white blue, to roar it out. Her hand clenched in reaction, tightening her hold and she pulled her Nymph back and up, and when the cry was done their mouths connected in a hard kiss, the kind that bruised.

The ache was eased, and fiercely so, but as soon as their lips connected it erupted back into life in her and visions, potent ones, played in the back of her mind, threatened the minimum composure she'd worked for. She growled into the kiss, let her tongue plunder and invade and be received. She leaned down, or was pulled, until they were both nearly prone. Miranda's free hand anxiously stroked down the younger woman's side and curved around to capture one luscious breast.

The anxious kiss broke, but only just, and Miranda's teeth and lips scraped down Andrea's vulnerable neck. She broke skin, tasted blood. The urgency scaled in her. Intentions changed and her touch changed, becoming rougher and at the same time silkier.

She rolled a tight nipple between her fingertips, played it without quite pinching, and then drew a claw down it; without cutting, because that would be an absolute sin to break perfection. Andy arched toward her, and they moved, repositioning, because of the younger woman's need to open for her. Miranda moved between her legs, drawing her claws along the underside of one of the younger woman's breast and scoring just enough to sting, while she captured the other between her teeth. She pulled without biting and then surrendered to the urge to suck, to lick and taste.

Andrea pushed up against her. Her body, which had cooled was heating again, and it was if a river of passion had been ignited in the younger woman. Miranda felt the sliding wetness, knew that Andrea was hungry for her, needful of her. Her claws raked down, stopping at the tip of Andrea's rib cage and then moving to her side and down her torso, before sliding around one of her thighs.

She inhaled. The woman's scent was even more aphrodisical, calling Miranda to a deeper passion until she felt as if she wanted to be inside the girl's skin. Brunette curls wrapped wetly around her fingertips, but she didn't linger there, nor, did she tease Andrea this time. She willed her claws away, not willing to harm the girl with what she needed to do next, which was to be inside her. To fill her.

Two fingers pressed in and Andrea jerked and pushed. Her hands suddenly anchored around Miranda's arm and she held her in place. "More!"

Well.

Andrea rocked and cried out, "More. Miranda." It was a heartfelt demand, almost a mystical push and Miranda, who normally exercised great control in any circumstance, felt the strangest sense that something was on the horizon. She looked up an was caught by the light in Andrea's eyes, "Fill me."

Miranda carefully released her grip in Andrea's head and grasped her at the shoulder, the one not bit, pushing her down. She withdrew her other hand, but only enough to allow her to plunge back in with three fingers instead. The pressure was astonishingly sexual, primal. Her thumb brushed across Andrea's jewel as she thrust.

And suddenly it wasn't just Andrea wanting more. Those visions hit again, the need to take her mate, the need to fill her mate, the need to be in …

Andrea cried out, was caught in the next great wave of pleasure. Miranda felt it, felt the way she clamped around her and shivered, and she felt so powerful. She wanted more.

As if hearing that unspoken, not even really thought out impulse, Andrea responded. "Yes!"

It was an invocation, a provocation.

Miranda, who never shifted without her will, was pushed and pulled from the inside. Silver hair glinted in the sunlight, covered her and then receded, but not before the change in her aspect was wrought. She felt the briefest form of dizzy, and then an unexpected heavy, throbbing sensation. It was distracting enough that she stopped moving, stopped thrusting.

Andrea, even as anxious as she was for release, paused. "What?"

"I... I..."

They both looked down, from different angles. Astonishment ghosted along their faces.

The brunette's eyes, chocolate dark, popped wide and she squeaked. "What is that?"

Miranda's voice was rough, her own azure gaze equally wide, "Me."

A self check, where she leaned back and felt herself down there had her exhaling relief. It was one thing to fantasize, to hunger, and Freud could go to blazes, because it had nothing to do with envy, but it was quite another in reality. But she was wet and she was still excited enough to know that she ached to a delicate point and all it would take is a few touches from Andrea to set her off, but now... she stared down at the thick, long muscle that seemed to point exactly where it and she wanted to go.

"How?"

Miranda knew, but it was so rare. As always there were rumors, myths... stories. She had heard of it, had, since Andrea erupted into her life, felt deeper compulsions, but this was the first time the physical aspect had ever... She pulled from the stories and generalized. "I'm an Alpha," which was true enough, "and you..." It was the first time she would say the word and she had no idea how the girl would respond, "... are my destined mate."

"Oh." Andrea took a moment to process. Then she exhaled a near worshipful, "I want that." Which turned imperious. "Give it to me."

Miranda's grin turned very toothy. Her hands grasped the younger woman by the hips, drawing her forward. Andrea's legs were already splayed, but she reached forward, grasping hold.

Miranda gasped at the surging response. It took her aback, while at the same time filling her with an incredible urgency. And then, what Andrea did once she had hold, the smooth, almost tender stroke... It thrilled her in an almost pre-verbal way. The, "oh," that burst from her lips was just shy of a grunt

Andrea's grin was just on the cusp of cheeky, but her expression could otherwise have melted steel. Or hardened it. Miranda felt herself thicken. Andrea pulled her forward, gently, until the tip was brushing against the silky line and then, just a little deeper. The brunette rocked, causing them to slide together and then, pressing her against a point that gave, she held still. Miranda tempted by everything, captured the brunette's lips in another demanding kiss.

"Please. Please, inside me. I need you." Andrea whispered as the kiss deepened.

Miranda pushed, achingly slow, but wanting to feel every point of connection as it happened until she was settled deeply, wonderfully, with Andrea wrapped like heaven's velvet around her.

She breathed through her nose, struggling for control, unaware of the near animal sound of need she made. Then Andrea said, "More. Please, please take me. Please..."

"Are you trying to break me?" At least, that was what she tried to say, but then, as if her hips had always known what to do, she moved, pistoning, at first slowly and then with deeper, more rapid plunges, with a hungry verve.

The beast showed in her eyes, her voice, her teeth and touch. Miranda was driven. Mate. Mine. The words rolled in her head and the more they did, the more she focused on them. Andrea held to her, shockingly, clung and pulled and bucked back with an equal, surprising ferocity. Miranda felt the skin on her back get scored, smelled a hint of her own blood. Smiled.

Until the younger woman tilted back and she was reminded, that her mate, her Andrea had been Marked. The wound, still raw and red and unhealed, wasn't just a mere irritation. It was something that could not be born. A different kind of noise, one that only arose with dangerous intention, with results administered far too quickly, snarled past.

Andrea had time to open her eyes, see the literal physical shift and feel the brush of silver fur against her cheek, to register that she felt a powerful fullness, before she felt sharp teeth latch onto the already wounded shoulder; piercing and covering the bite.

It should have been followed by a bellow of pain, but a lightening shock, roared through them both.

The ground shook and erupted around them. Finger-like spikes of stones, thick and impossible, rose around them; not encasing them, but as if the ground were called to rise.

Miranda did not let go, did not cease taking what was hers, was oblivious to all the heady danger of the buckling earth. She wrapped her arms around a glowing Andrea, lifting her, pulling her closer, driving into her. Claiming her.

Energy spiraled around them, through them. Andrea ground against Miranda, taking in the greatness of her, abandoning herself to the moment. Her eyes opened and were filled with a greening light. She held to Miranda, one hand on her powerful shoulder, the other on her thick thigh. Her toes dug into the dirt, pushing her forward onto her mate. She pulsed against the shifter, hips rotating as well as rocking, inner velvet clenching and unclenching. Grass, vines and flowers shredded the blanket upon which they rode, rose around them, like a shield.

Miranda cried out as she felt her ankles captured, wrapped around, "bitten" by thorns, but she refused to let go, held to her mate, pounded into her. She growled her possession, refused to fight the rising fire in her blood. Hers. Hers. Hers. From the very first, hers. Everything that was Andrea, hers. Body, hers. Babe, hers. Everything, hers. Everything.

She claimed it. She wanted it. She needed it. Her mate and mage. Her Nymph. Hers.

Then she heard the companion words. At last. At last.

"Yours." Andrea's growl was a thing of light and magic. "Mine! Yes!" Then, where before she was merely glowing, she shone, erupted. Light blew out from her, through and past Miranda, in a great bubble. The stone that had grown around them shattered, pulverized, as Andrea cried out her culmination, her rising. Trees grew, transformed and vibrated. Miranda clung as profound waves of pleasure rushed through her and she poured into Andrea, spilled and gushed into the light, and was nearly just as shattered as the stone, but re-formed; equally claimed.

Her jaws finally loosed. Around her ankles the vines disappeared, seemed to melt into her skin as light and then were gone. The wound on Andrea's shoulder poured out more light, then closed over, leaving only a perfect imprint of Miranda's more human teeth.

Andrea flung her arms around Miranda and they clung to each other, riding out the cascade as one.

Once again in the pool, this time they rested languidly in the shallow portion. Andrea reclined against Miranda, whose hand splayed loosely on her belly. The cool water and shade was a boon. They were both mildly hot from their exertions and ready for respite; momentarily.

Miranda nuzzled Andrea's neck, pecking a light kiss where a more traditional kind of love-bruise rose. She ignored the gentle rise in her libido, knowing it would become demanding soon enough.

"How will we manage?" she muttered. A mated pair, especially early on, remained close to each other. She glanced around at the changes around the waterfall. It had been green before, in the sense that it was part of the forest and pretty, but now it was beautiful, gorgeous, as if heaven's finger had touched the ground; which it had. She gazed with affection at her Andrea.

"Manage?"

"You're a Nymph. I... am the editor of Runway."

Andrea laughed. "Among other things. And since we're putting it that way, I'm a freelance writer. I can pretty much..." she sighed. "Be where I want to be."

Miranda looked to the side and blinked in confusion. "But... I thought, given location..."

Andrea turned around in her arms. She gazed into blue eyes that were anything but ice. Then she said, very seriously, very calmly. "You think I am bound to this land?"

"Aren't you? I mean, given..."

Andrea dared what no one else ever would. She pressed her fingertips to Miranda's lips, effectively shushing her. "No. No I am not. I am not ever going to be ..." She winced a little, but she had accepted this as how it was and she tried a different way, "Most Nymphs, yes, have specific locations or talents. I think we're both aware that things have changed for me." Behind her, the water rose in the pool and fanned out like a fountain, before dropping away. "Think of me as a Catalyst, Miranda. One might call me a forest nymph, but even then, you could drop me in the desert..." She laughed, "And I'm not sure it would remain desert. Or it might, depending. I am, what you might call, a very rare breed of Nymph. My family..." They would be incredibly shocked, but happy at her transformation. She wasn't sure how they might take her mating. "... will be surprised, as it was assumed that I would be largely powerless. The majority of my kind are indeed bound by their land, but those like me, are born to ensure that there is always land to be bound to. There are, however, ways around it, for travel, but I've never needed them, even in the beginning. I guess now I know why. But, honestly, Miranda, I think my real calling, my real power, may be even simpler."

"And that is?"

"Loving you. Being with you."

Miranda's breath caught and her heart warmed. She pulled Andrea tight to her and whispered against her lips, "That might be my calling too. My Andrea."


	8. TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt 7 End

**TDWP: The Devil's Run Pt. 7 (End)**

"Where have you been?" Miranda took off the glasses she did not need and folded them one handed. She set them on her desk and looked up at the latest intruder to her office. It had been that kind of day.

"Been? Been? I have been all over God's green earth trying to find you!" Nan exclaimed, her hands waving excitedly.

"Nan, didn't you get the invitation?"

"You know my minions handle that. What invitation?"

"The birthday soiree, at the Preserve?"

"The Preserve, why would..." Nan moved to the couch and abruptly sat down on its edge. "Oh. No. I was not informed. Though I should have been. I do have a present for you." She dropped her purse on the floor by the couch and then looked around, her expression puzzled. "Dear, your office has accumulated plants."

"I'm told plants are good for offices. It supposedly freshens the air, or some such. Nan, why were you looking for me?" Miranda sat back in her chair and swiveled for a better look at her friend, who though she was coiffed and spectacularly well preserved, had a tired set to her shoulders. "Have you slept at all?"

"To warn you, of course. And, not for a day or two, but I'll catch up. I have something to tell you and you need to sit down."

Miranda did not point out that she already was. "Alright," she said evenly.

"I was given the heads up that a certain person of our common acquaintance, interested in rising to greater heights, decided it might be a good idea to attempt to somehow get into your good graces."

"I dread to know the details, but do continue."

"This person learned of a certain other person, whose name you insist I not use, so he didn't get it from me."

"Ah, a he."

"Or so they tell us." Nan sighed. She put a hand to her face and said, "Oh, I'm tired. Why did you have to remind me. I had myself convinced I was doing fine."

"Slip of the tongue. What did he do?"

"He had her delivered to certain of your People."

"I see. And?"

"That's it. I have no idea where she went after that. He is in his usual location." Nan lifted a hand and pointed at the ceiling, which caused Miranda's eyes to look up.

"Well, you have answered a question that has been bothering me." Miranda's lips curled in distaste. "Rats in the house." In this case, a form of literalism. Irv's rivalry spanned not just their professional lives, but territory. Rival packs weren't always of the same kind and territories did sometimes cross, and when rival packs worked in the same field, clashes were inevitable, and usually memorable.

"No thanks necessary. This couch doesn't happen to be a pull out?"

"It is, but you'd have much more rest at my place. The guest room is made up." Miranda stood and exhaled a soft call, "Emily."

The newest Emily skittered into the office, looking like deer before the wolf. She was still learning to adapt.

"Call Roy. Nan will meet him downstairs when she is ready. That's all." The young woman backed out quickly, grateful the task was simple.

"And I am ready now, I'm afraid, though I did intend to linger, should you need me."

"I will now know where to find you. Next time, please call."

"I did. But all your numbers have been changed."

"Darling, I think you need to check for rats in your own house. My numbers are quite the same."

"They are? Oh!" Nan's exhale had a touch of flame to it, but she covered it well. She stood up, not wobbly at all, but obviously feeling the burn of too many second winds. "That may also explain my 'lost' invitation, since my people know to deliver correspondence regarding you immediately. I shall see you at the townhouse?"

"You may count on it." Miranda's hand lifted and a set of keys sailed through the air to be caught one-handed by her friend; who then turned and started down the long central corridor which lead to Miranda's office.

She was about half-way to the elevator when the bell chimed. The doors swished open, revealing light and the very subject of the intrigue she had uncovered, who then stepped out. The younger woman's outfit was the essence of simplicity, a cream above the knee dress, belted with what looked like a wrap-around of ivy leaves. Her accents were all similarly flavored, from the four-inch heels to her emerald earrings.

Nan paused and exhaled, feeling a profound relief. As the younger woman drew closer, she said, "Ah. Ms. Sachs. I see Miranda caught up with you. I enjoyed your most recent article."

Andrea's smile seemed to brighten the hall. "Thank you. And yes, she did." She reached out, taking one of Nan's hands. "You look lovely as ever."

The young woman's eyes flashed, turning a near gold, which faded into their usual brown. She squeezed Nan's hand gently, before letting go.

"I... Thank you." Nan looked back at Miranda's office and then at the writer. Suddenly she felt much less tired. "I think I might stop for a bite to eat before visiting the townhouse. Will you..."

"I'll see you there."

This time it was Nan's smile that shone. "Brilliant. I want to hear all about it."

Andrea nodded her head, all graciousness, and they separated, with Nan taking the empty elevator and herself heading to Miranda's office.

"Don't disturb us," Andrea said in passing, hardly looking at either Emily, both of whom she knew barely. She entered the office without asking or announcing herself. Then shut the door behind her and slid a deadbolt into place.

"Andrea." Her name was said in long, slow syllables. The brunette smiled, as she kicked off her heels with practiced ease and then paced, barefoot, toward Miranda.

Miranda swiveled around in her chair, at first intending to stand, but she was beat to the punch when Andy pushed her back down and then straddled her lap. The brunette took her face in her hands, then gently, insistently, she began to kiss her mate. It was a good minute before she pulled away with a smile reminiscent of the cat that ate the canary. "Hi."

If Miranda had an intention to warn of time or business, that intention faded with each sultry taste. By the time Andrea pulled back, work was far from her mind. She managed a pleasantry, which came out raspy and hot. "Hello."

"I have news." Andrea's hands dropped from Miranda's face, and dropped to her waist. Her smile was easy, anticipatory.

"Do tell."

"We're fine."

Miranda let go a breath she did not know she'd been holding. She closed her eyes and felt something settle. She had not wanted Andrea to go alone, but it had been necessary and they had compromised. The young woman had gone to see Miranda's physician, a specialist who worked with the People and understood the complications, few as they might be, that happened with shifters. The physician had been made aware of the circumstances, relating to Andrea's previous condition and the hunt, and the mating. While Miranda had still been able to scent the changes in Andrea's body, there had been a subtle alteration and she had needed, no, wanted, professional reassurance.

It is similar to the reason why she chose to avoid putting Andrea through a second gauntlet of meeting her People after the Hunt. Until she, Miranda, knew all was well, she had no desire to add to the pressure that Andrea had already experienced. Nor did she want her People to know of her anger just yet. Thus, when they had finished their time at the waterfall, she'd summoned a door and had taken Andrea home, to the townhouse, to rest.

As much as they were able, considering. Today's distance from each other, necessary as it was, had been trying for Miranda and staff at _Runway_ had suffered the consequences.

"I'd have brought a picture, but there is nothing to see yet. Just... we're fine."

Miranda opened her eyes and laid her hand on Andrea's belly. "Good." Her smile was spare, filled with relief and genuine. Then, because she could and it was true. She growled softly, pressing so very lightly, but enough that Andrea could feel it. "Mine."

Andrea leaned forward, smile on her lips. "Always." She kissed Miranda again, this time giving in to the warm abandon. Around them, underneath Miranda's feet, throughout her office, the greening rose and bloomed and the air, indeed, freshened.

End


End file.
